


The Stranger

by planefag



Category: Senki Zesshou Symphogear
Genre: Action, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-14
Packaged: 2019-06-27 01:48:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 22,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15675591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/planefag/pseuds/planefag
Summary: It's a Symphogear user's story. He just lives in it.





	1. VOLUME ONE, PART ONE - THE BABYLONIAN'S SHOTGUN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arrival.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a lot of humor in this story, there probably always will be, but it's not a happy story, nor is it ever likely to be. When you reach the end of chapter 2, you'll understand what I mean.

Few things are as grotesquely beautiful as shooting someone in zero-g. Brain matter and blood blossomed in a symmetrical nova behind the SS trooper, sans an eye and still coming, ricocheting off the bulkhead towards me with fangs bared. I snapped the rifle's stock through a curt arc to his face, his fangs sinking into the polymer and ripping it from my grasp as I kicked him away. He launched himself at me in time to meet my saber as it sprang from the scabbard, blazing brilliantly as it bisected the bastard with a simple diagonal slash. The halves smacked into me, smearing my sullied white suit further before tumbling into the dark halls behind, trailing little globs of blood.

“Please say a command,” a cheerful voice chirped in my ear, a small saber-shaped icon flashing on my HUD.

“This is happening,” I muttered.

“According to Wikipedia,” the neutral feminine voice rolled on, “This Is Happening is the third studio album by American Rock band LCD So-”

“AAAAAAAARGH!” I roared, hurling myself headlong down the hall with a blast from the MMU's thrusters towards the next vampire just rounding the corner, a golden Luger snapping towards me snake-quick. The saber flared as I slashed it through his sight-line, liquefied lead splattering off my suit before I cannonballed into his belly helmet-first. We slammed into the bulkhead together and rebounded into empty space, his fangs already working on my arm. A blast from the MMU set us spinning, feet flying outward from each other as the beast clung stubbornly to my wrist with demonic strength - until I slammed my gloved fist into his face. We flew apart, slamming into the walls opposite one another with stunning force. Rounding on each other, we braced feet against bulkheads, ready to spring. His hand blurred, a silvered SS ritual dagger glinting with wicked promise as he snarled silently in the vacuum.

I turned my gloved palm up, letting the cap of a _Stielhandgranate_ float free before flipping him the bird.

My visor dimmed automatically as his first 'nade caused the rest to sympdet, bits of vampire splattering over my once-white suit. Without air to carry the shockwave, only a smear of gore and a faint cloud of expanding gas was left.

Then the floor leapt up and kicked me in the ass.

“Fuck!” I snapped, gasping for breath as my tailbone checked in. “Fuckbuggering-”

“Language,” Geo's voice chided me. “By the way, you've got a problem.”

“Yeah, we're accelerating,” I grunted, heaving the sudden weight of my suit upright. “I noticed-”

“No, something worse. We need to talk.”

I found my beam saber and stagger the last few feet towards the final door, the rumble of rocket engines shivering through my boots and up my spine. “I'm a big boy. Spit it out.”

A pregnant pause, laden with regret and faint static, and then-

“Is it _really_ okay to punch a Naz-”

My roar overloaded the air-ground loop as I slashed an X-shape in the door and kicked it in. The occupants sprang for me as one, Degen swords flashing like quicksilver into the attack.

I dove aside, closing off their lines with their own comrade as silicon valley science and cursed steel met in a bright flare of sparks and light. A quick kick to his chest sent him sprawling into his buddy, who caught him on the flat of his blade and hurled him back at me, silvered point flashing into a wild lunge. My saber flashed through a complete circle, beating away the thrust before twirling over the top into a number-two cut through his wrist - and then I lunged myself, plunging the saber up to its ergonomic hilt into his chest and through, lifting him off his feet and slamming him, blade and all, into his buddies stacked up behind in the narrow doorway. The saber flashed upward, and three coal-scuttle helmets hit the deck in six pieces.

“Yeah,” I panted weakly, pointing my saber at the six pairs of eyeballs rolling loose on the deckplates. “Lookit me... I'm... the Captain... now...”

“You have the bridge?” Geo demanded.

“I have...” the rainbow glow glinted off my helmet as I took in the endless streaming lines of bright runes that seem to flow up and down and all around, like luminous ghosts gliding just beneath the glossy obsidian surface of the walls. “Yeah, lets go with that.”

“I've got the feed... looks like a combination of German Alchemy, Egyptian Xeno-math and-”

“Just get me the fuck off Himmler's Moving Castle, please.”

“I need time, goddammit!”

I crossed the high-vaulted chamber, past the command chairs and sweeping control panels sculpted from the same dark stone, around the glowing, pulsating orb on its plinth in the center, and over to the open balcony opposite. I could see clear across the castle's wide courtyard, where ground crews were clearing away hoses and equipment from the base of - I counted - _ten_ V-2 rockets, their ominous black nosecones pointing straight up at the breathtaking vista of Earth, hanging silent and beautiful in the darkness.

Silent and beautiful and _very, very large._

“Yeeeah, how 'bout Plan Baysplosions on the control consoles?” I muttered, eying the stick grenades rolling around in the spreading pool of blood by the doorway.

“No dice. The command code's been modified but this is definitely-”

“-another fucking shotgun,” I finished.

“Yep!”

“Alas fucking _Babylon_ ,” I growl, looking up at Earth and flipping the Middle East the bird. “Well that just leaves...” I peered at the V-2s again, thinking.

“GBI can handle those,” Geo said, following my gaze via suitcam. “You need to-”

“Blow this place sky-” I glanced “up” at Earth “higher. Those warheads-”

“Electric contact fuze in the nosecone. Unless you can throw a rock or something-”

“What are the fuel tanks on those made out of?”

A brief flurry of clickety-clack as he hammered at his damn mechanical keyboard. “Magnesium-aluminum alloy, wh-”

A beat.

“You have your gyrojet-”

“Lost it,” I muttered. The rockets were seconds from launch, Nazi vampires doffing their protective gear as labcoated ones crowded the control consoles. Eyeballing the distance, I hefted the saber to judge the mass and cocked my arm for a good toss-

“Wait! You've got a backup!”

“I what.”

“In your maneuver pack-”

“... and I didn't know this _why-_ ”

“TICKTOCK!”

I reached behind my shoulder with a sigh. “I swear to god if this is more of your weeb bullshit-”

“It's not!” he insisted as the pack obligingly slapped something into my hand via manipulators and science geek shit unseen. It proved a long, thin bundle about a foot long. “The fuck is-”

With a _snap!_ I felt rather than heard, the whole shebang telescoped out into a bow and a clip-on quiver of black-shafted carbon-fiber arrows, complete with yellow-striped explosive tips.

“Are you _fucking_ k-”

“SHUT UP AND TAKE THE SHOT, YOU MORON!”

Nocking an arrow and taking stance, I grunted as I took up the heavy draw - eighty pounds at least. “Swear to god,” I muttered, “I'll drown you in the _toilet._ ”

Lining up the trajectory predictions on my HUD with the exact center of the nearest rocket, I loosed.

Twas elegant, admittedly, but not _simple,_ the lethal black dart trailed by a thin white contrail as tiny rockets imparted stabilizing spin in lieu of fletching. It arced unerringly through the vacuum, dwindling to a faint black speck against the dark cobblestones -

-and then _everything_ exploded. My visor darkened as I ducked behind the balcony's low wall, afterimages of the perfectly symmetric fireballs of zero-G explosions lingering in my eyes. Awful, jolting shudders rippled through the dark obsidian as blast after titanic blast, each larger than the last, ripped through the guts of the castle, digging deep into the rock outcropping it was built on. The floor bucked beneath me and dropped away, gravity vanishing as the acceleration sto-

***

Everything was black for a while.

***

I faded back in gradually, vision still tinged gray. I was floating free in a cloud of debris - tanks, shattered stone, broken bits of gargoyle, MP-40s, and lots and _lots_ of swastikas in all shapes and sizes tumbling lazily by. Naturally, someone was shouting in my ear.

“Yeah, yeah,” I bitched, shaking my head woozily. “Blacked out for a second-”

“Not that,” Geo barked. “LOOK DOWN!”

“... dude. Space.”

“Technically, no,” he said tersely, and I _did_ look around - in time to see what looks like the shattered remnants of a flying-wing bomber beginning to burn as it hit the upper atmosphere of Earth.

“.... ohh.”

“Yeah.”

“Geo, if you got any more Go-Go-Google-Gadget bullshit up your sleeve, this'd be a _fantastic_ fucking time to dig it out,” I said tersely as a nice big chunk of castle started to tumble as it hits the re-entry interface. The trajectory projected on my HUD gave me about fifteen minutes till things started getting toasty in my suit.

“Uh, there _is_ one thing-”

“The earth is getting very large, Geo.”

“You're not gonna like it!”

“SPIT IT OUT!”

“Moose.”

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath of sterile suit air. “Oh, yeah,” I said innocently. “Yeah, that'll work.”

“It will?” Geo wondered, before amending with “It will, it will! Yes!”

“Sure,” I agreed breezily, using my MMU to rotate slowly as I scanned the debris field, looking for something, anything - _options._

“Listen, materiel science has come a long way since the 60s,” he insisted worriedly. “We've run the simulations a hundred times, it'll work fine.”

“Of course,” I said, focusing on a brief flash of white in the distance - RCS thrusters firing. Something black, white, and spooky all over was maneuvering to avoid debris.

“We didn't _want_ to do this,” Geo's insisted, “this was just backup, emergency, last-ditch stuff, so it had to be as low-mass as possible, you know, like a reserve chute, but it'll still do the job, man, we spared no expense on it-”

“Yep,” I replied, turning my suit to face the earth below as I translated sideways with gentle, steady thrust, keeping a careful eye on the fuel reserves. Only my forward suitcam was piped to Ground Control, so I turned my head and watched the unknown craft over my shoulder.

“-so really, it just would've worried you if we told you about all this emergency stuff, so we decided, you know, better to let you focus on the mission-”

“Keep my burden to the proper proportion,” I agreed amicably, flicking the thrusters a bit to keep the target stationary over my right shoulder. “So I didn't get off track.”

“Exactly!” he shouted with obvious relief. “So lets just get the gear out and get you set-up ahead of time, double-check the... trajectories...” Vague concern creeps into his voice. “What are you doing?”

“Nothing~” I sing-songed with wicked glee as I close on the target, which was just sliding out from the shadow of a craggy chunk of castle wall. With the ceramic tiles shining in the sun, the mystery evaporated. Sidle up behind it, I found the access panel, fishing out a multitool from my thigh pocket.

“We just got a call from the Air Force,” Geo states, his unease growing.

“I bet you did,” I agreed, screws floating past me as I exposed the payload bay, Ethernet cable in hand. For some odd reason the designers didn't think to firewall the payload bay's own I/O ports, so I had full access almost instantly. Crouching atop the X-37 drone, I ensured my boots got a good mag-lock and started securing the cable up the underside of my leg with Kapton tape. “Director on the phone?”

“And he looks pissed.”

“Why don't you sneak over there and listen in, or something?”

“You know I can't-”

“I can take care of myself,” I insisted. “After all, the government gave me a bag full of fucking _foam_ for a heat shield, so there's nothing to worry about. Just gotta follow the directions on the package, like a microwave burrito.”

“Dude,” he began, his brittle optimism cracking, “I know it's...”

“Hmm?” I ask, keeping my suit cam focused on my thigh as I worked my way up the leg of the suit.

“What,” he intones with growing horror, “are you doing.”

I panned upwards enough for him to see the tiled nose of the drone. “Can we keep her?”

I enjoyed his sounds of choking horror for a few more seconds before shutting off the air-to-ground circuit. The shuttle was already beginning to rotate slightly as it bumped the edge of atmo - it had enough fuel to boost to safe orbit, even with my mass, but I had less than thirty minutes of life support left.

It was now or never.

Numbers flowed across my HUD as suit and shuttle computers feed me a constant stream of information; pitch, roll, surface heating, center of gravity, altitude, velocity, orbital parameters. Crouching low, I shifted my weight to help the ship's gyroscope pitch it properly for re-entry. Cuing the MMU to slap the MOOSE into my hand, I found it to be a small, silver package with a simple diagram indicating I should unfold it. I wrestled with it; even the smaller, nimble gloves of my mechanical-pressure suit had trouble with the thin mylar coating. It felt like folding a map. I finally snapped it open to find another pictogram inside on a small bottle affixed to the back, beckoning me to climb in, face the opening, and pull the little string. Instead I just reached in and yanked the cord without hesitation.

A thin stream of liquid began to issue from the bottle, expanding quickly into a thick foam as it filled the back, cementing firmly around my arm. Soon I had a large, if dubious, heat shield of sorts. I angled it forward and crouched low to the drone to hug its protection as much as possible. My suit started to weigh on me as the shuttle began deaccelerating as it hit the re-entry interface. With the ship's shuddering rising through my boots, I tried to think of some poignant last words to feed my suit recorder.

“Still better than flying United.”

**********

I hit Japanese airspace at 28,000 feet and a hair over 900 knots.

Guiding the X-37 through some gentle S-turns shed some speed, like a snowboarder, but I was still coming in too hot and high as I steadied on my landing zone; the wide, long expanse of Tokyo bay. I quavered with indecision for a few seconds, then leaned forward to push my ship's nose down, shedding altitude sharply.

 _Fuck_ it.

The sonic boom blew out half the windows at Fleet Activities Yokosuka as I screamed overhead, leaning back to pitch up into a sharp flare. Vision tingeing red, I squeezed a stale breath against my sternum, fighting the negative Gs - but I was slowing, and the ship was holding. The thirty-mile length of the bay was fading fast as I shed the last thousand feet of altitude, yet I was still booking at one-eighty when the drone's belly kissed the water, skipping off the surface like a flat stone. I kicked the tail into the next wave and caught just enough air to clear a sailboat with two stunned-looking occupants, then judged the remaining distance to the beach carefully. As beachgoers scattered wildly, umbrellas and beach-balls flying every which way in the stampede, I yanked my ripcord. My 'chute fluttered and unfurled with a violent yank that almost peeled me off the bird - but the maglock boots held, and the shuttle slowed precipitously as I roared through the shallows. The X-37s ceramic nose kissed the sand and slid through the lapping surf gracefully, grinding to a slow halt wrapped in discarded beach towels and part of an umbrella.

I popped the chute quick-release as the crowd began to coalesce again, dead silent and staring. Undogging my helmet clamps, I pulled it off, tossed my sweat-soaked hair out of my eyes, and sucked in a deep breath of cool, salty air.

Noticing the crowd's blank stares, I just spiked my helmet into the beach, leaned back and bellowed -

“TADAIMAAAAA, **MOTHERFUCKERS!”**

*******

Adult Supervision caught up with me about a half-hour later, courtesy of Prompt Global Shitstorm. The sonic boom was unmistakable, but I was counting on an extra fifteen minutes to deplane, spin up a Blackhawk and fly the thirty-odd miles from Yokota, so when The Director alighted on the beach wearing a steerable canopy and an ugly expression, I was caught dead to rights. He stormed towards the small ramen stand I was sitting at, carefully feeding noodles through my cracked-open visor (the O2 was almost exhausted, but there was plenty of power left for the air conditioning.) I waved at him with my chopsticks.

He popped the quick-release on his canopy as he closed in. “Check ignition,” he growled, cracking his knuckles, “and may God's love be with you.”

“Heeeey, heeeyyyy, heeeeyyyyyyy,” I intoned, waggling my chopsticks like an admonishing finger. “My ship knew which way to-”

His hands fell on the shoulders of my suit with the weight of his long suffering soul behind them, before slamming my faceplate against his forehead. His hate shone out from under furrowed brows at me.

“ _Your_ ship,” he breathed.

I flicked my eyes sidelong at the beach's edge, where a small swarm of Navy personnel were standing around the X-37 with lifting straps and uncertain expressions. Someone with stars on his shoulder was leaning against the ship, cheek pressed to the ceramic tiles like he was cooing to it.

I looked back at the Director's hate-filled scowl.

“Just my joooob~” I sang, slooowly lowering the reflective golden sun-visor. “Five days a weeeeek~”

“And you're still on the clock, you little _shit_ ,” he said, punctuating it with a hard shove that sent me and my stool sprawling in the sand. “Gomenasai,” he said to the flint-eyed older woman behind the ramen stand's counter, hefting my stool in both hands as he steadied his grip.

“Don't you mean BAAANZAAAI-!” I shouted as I scrabbled backwards hastily.

“That means ten thousand years of life,” the Director hissed as he advanced on me, stool raised high. “So, _no_ **.** ” I curled up as he brought the stool down on me; the thick kevlar outer shell and inner myomer skinsuit blunting the impact considerably. He wound up again, eyes ablaze as he whaled on my supine and mostly-impervious form with all his strength, snarling -

“ -NEXT TIME JUST GET IN THE **FUCKING** BAG-”

\- until he was well winded, staggering above me with a broken stool leg in each hand. I peeked out from under my arm, analyzing his apparent torpor.

“... you done?” I asked.

He glared at me and twitched one arm just to make me flinch. “Why... don't you get up... and... find out...”

I scooted out of range before lurching to my feet - even without the primary life support pack, the suit was pretty bulky. I opened my visor so it wouldn't muffle my voice. “Cleanup boys took the sub-orbital, eh?”

He tapped his sticks against his legs and glowered at me a bit more. “No. HQ team.”

I blinked. “What.”

“A certain someone's requesting Uncle Sam's help with security at a big concert,” he clarified, wiping sweat from his brow, “and since you're already here, guess who's nominated, Mister Fuckin _Rocketman?”_

“ _..._ no.”

“ _Yes,_ ” he breathed with unholy relish.

I twisted my helmet off, hurled it into the sand, and pointed at the sky. “BUT-”

“You picked your LZ,” he almost cheered, waggling a splintered stool leg at me. “NOW LAND IN IT!”

A cry went up from the police-corralled crowd as something big thundered into the bay with a mighty WOOMPH. I jabbed my finger at the better part of a Panzer IV tumbling exhaust-over-mantlet before plowing under in the shallows.

The Director shrugged. “Hey man, it's all them heroics I don't understand-”

“Fuck _you_ -”

“JUST MY JOOOB~” he sing-songed, twirling on his heel and tossing away the remnants of the stool as he pranced away towards the parking lot, “FIVE DAAYS A WEEK~”

“SPACE. VAMPIRE. NAZIS!” I roared at his retreating back. I rounded on the crowd next, staring at me wide-eyed and silent past the police cordon. “WHAT!?”

“Ah ah ah~” the Director's voice came from the parking lot, where a black car with US diplomatic flags fluttering gaily from the hood was idling patiently. “OPSEC!”

I glanced upwards at the contrails of re-entering tanks, castle, and Nazi Vampires, then back to the Director.

He grinned savagely. “You coming, or do I need to get out the tow rope?”

I stooped for my helmet and stomped up to the parking lot, muttering about how I'd fly the OPSEC up his tight-wound ass next time. He helped my bulky suit into the back seat with a hefty kick to the rear, and slung himself in opposite.

“Where to, sir?”

The Director opened his mouth, but I spoke up first. “Swing by Aka... arky-... arkham- gaddammit, the creepy nerd place,” I said.

The driver gave me a funny look in the rear-view. “Akihabara?”

The Director slid me a wary look. “What for?”

“Just want to pick up a manga,” I growled.

***

The safehouse was a sin against both God and Man.

Given the damage that Bringing The Noise did to Iwakuni, an off-base safehouse, complete with secret subterranean base, seemed ideal, but to _get_ there you had to walk into the aftermath of a six-way meme collision with its twisted heart shocked to horrific, shambling unlife by a bolt of pure cancer.

This is why, when I walked into the alleged cafe, a girl in a maid costume, wearing a cat-ear headband, airsoft MP5 and slash bandolier and cradling a large rabbit in her arms took one look at my spacesuited self and said “you must be the new guy, right?”

The Director was blocking my retreat out the door, so I just popped my helmet on and moon-walked down the central aisle of the retro-50s decorated diner till I backed through the door concealing the secret elevator. Except they didn't, and I had to wait for ten minutes for the Director to pry me out of the broom closet with a mop, because after an exit like that you can't damn well show up again. Besides, I had a smartphone.

The Director's actually named Dan, but I've never thought of him as Dan, even after I came to know him better - he was still just The Dan, because he's a singularly unique... existence. Picture the clean-cut, boyishly-good-looking-yet-disarmingly-approachable every(salary)man character they cast as The Producer in all those shitty idolesque animes - then _skin_ the motherfucker and use that hide to clothe a chaotic mass of seething thundercloud, and that's The Dan. I didn't describe him upon his “first appearance” because that'd be like describing Bruce Banner via delineating the Hulk. By the time the (rather sedate and creaky) elevator had reached the ground floor, he'd reverted to his mostly human form once more; kind of like a deflated amoeba slowly slurphing towards caffeine.

The interior was only marginally better than the surface; a dusty tomb of stark concrete hallways that bore the faint wall-marks highly suggestive of 50s-era computer consoles and the musty-canvas smell unique to military surplus stores. I found Geo already set up in the biggest room; sprawled on a couch salvaged from some doctor's waiting room and playing Imperishable Night on a 40-inch TV with a USB controller. Geo's best described as a Hollywood nerd stereotype cranked to 11; skinny, good looking, wild-haired and more laid back than a starfish. If not for The SystemD Incident, I'd still believe him mostly incapable of bipedal locomotion.

“Sup,” he said, not taking his eyes off the screen - looked like Reisen's final spellcard.

I smiled.

This caught his attention - he actually paused the game and flicked his eyes towards me, a budding sense of unease plain on his face.

I smiled wider, and held up my new manga - volume 130 of Golgo 13.

His eyes widened with the look of dawning realization I live for.

With my thumb, I flipped the book open to the marked page - [detailing the famous international assassin Golgo 13 in a space-suit as he kneels on a satellite and takes up the draw on a longbow.](https://imgur.com/a/mspvAEn)

For a couch-bound Linux geek, Geo can move fast, given proper motivation. He was almost to the door before I managed to lurch my suited self into motion, but his stockinged feet cornered poorly compared to my rubber-soled boots. We skidded into the main hallway of the bunker; a long stretch that faded into ominous darkness intermittently interrupted by flickering fluorescent fixtures.

“THE TOILET, MOTHERFUCKER!” I crowed as I ran him down. “THE FUCKING TOILET!”

He escaped his fate by baseball-sliding into a side room and clutching the pant-legs of The Dan, who was emptying a coffee carafe into a massive mug labeled WORLD'S #1 DIA OPERATIVE. The Dan blinked tired eyes a few times as he analyzed the situation.

“No.”

I held up the manga, open to the proper page.

“... yes,” he concluded, and yawned as Geo screeched like a little girl, trying to cram himself into the under-counter cupboard as I closed on him. I grabbed one leg and began reeling him in, hand-over-hand.

“... hello?”

I glanced at the doorway to see a boyishly-good-looking Japanese twenty-something in glasses - quite similar to the stranger smiling out from The Dan's ID badge. He adjusted his suit-tie nervously as he took in the tableau.

“Hey,” I said with a nod, then turned my attention back to Geo as he did his damnedest to squirm out of the wire wastebasket I was cramming down over his shoulders. “Hey, could I borrow your pen?”

He blinked and handed over the expensive-looking ballpoint in his breast pocket. I uncapped it, tested the sharpness, and started poking at Geo through the basket. The young man was carefully sidling away, conceding his pen to the Abyss, when The Dan loomed up behind him like a thunderhead. He froze as Dan leaned over his shoulder, reaching 'round to flip his badge up for inspection, then leaning over further to check his face.

“Ogawa,” the Dan muttered. “you're the SONG guy, right?”

“Uh, yes,” he said, stepping away from the Dan and pressing his back against the coffee counter. He hoisted the manila envelope in his hand like a shield. “I've got the briefing details right here.”

“Any word on-” the Dan slouched away from the doorway as Geo galloped past, still wearing the wastebasket. He cleared the doorway at full tilt and met the hallway wall with a definitive _thud._ “-supporting assets?” he finished smoothly.

“You _are_ the supporting assets, to be honest,” Ogawa said, his eyes flicking towards the groaning floating through the doorway. “Concert venues cover all the mundane concerns on a regular basis anyway; we'll have more city and prefecture police than we can use. But a more... capable response might be needed.”

The Dan slid his tired gaze towards me as my efforts to open a fresh packet of coffee with spacesuit gloves ended in a fountain of grounds all over the counter. A half-formed fuck prodded his lips towards the punchline before it mewled and died. “Yeah, okay. Cool.”

“So is this gonna be a stand-up fight,” I grumped as I tried to scrape the grounds off the counter and into the filter basket, “or just another Noise hunt?”

Ogawa blinked. “What?”

“He wants to know if he's gonna stand around with his thumb up his ass _waiting_ for something to happen,” the Dan sighed, “or if he's gonna stand around with his thumb up his ass _while_ it happens.”

“We've no reason to expect extra-dimensional threats at this time,” Ogawa said a bit stiffly. “The Forge of Babylon is sealed-”

The Dan and I snorted in unison.

“... I'll, just, prepare this, in the... conference room...” he muttered, slipping out as gracefully as he could manage.

“Noise hunt,” I yawned as I hammered the coffeemaker's start button.

“Noise hunt,” the Dan agreed as he blew back towards his desk like a westerly breeze.

Alone at last. I leaned against the counter, head lolling back against the cabinets, closed my eyes and checked the time. Late already - by the local clock, at least. Tedious as they were, the briefings couldn't be dispensed with, and there'd be a lot of information and groundwork to go over on the 'morrow.

The coffeemaker burbled quietly as I waited.

***

I turned my dreams off two years ago.

***

I came to around five minutes into the briefing proper, discovering an empty coffee mug in one hand, a half-gnawed bagel in the other, and a gigantic lion-man narrating powerpoint slides. His voice was deep and rich and strong, a baritone's voice, and I let it roll over me like a soothing tide of ching-chong-nip-nong _whatever_ as my mental wheels spun free, searching for traction.

The Voice stopped. I yawned extravagantly and checked to see if the briefing was over. Instead I found someone the size of four brick shithouses stacked together, untucked shirt's sleeves rolled up past his elbows, giving me a rather stern glance.

“Do you have a question?” he asked, raising one eyebrow in the finest Mildly Disappointed Dad impression one could ask for.

I moved to set down my bagel and mug - and froze as I caught sight of the huge table sprawling between us. My mouth slowly fell open as I stared at the massive map of downtown Tokyo, festooned with little metal figurines like an abandoned Warhammer game.

I looked up at the lion. “What the fuck is this?”

He looked. “A table,” he said in English.

Slamming down my alleged breakfast, I spun to find The Dan. “Dan. _Dude._ ”

“Howdy, _pardner,_ ” he muttered without looking up from his briefing packet.

“Why are we in this dump?” I demanded.

“Secret bunker,” he offered.

“Can't the bean-counters spring for a _hotel?_ ” I demanded.

“This place is secure and already has the communication gear,” he yawned, turning the page in his packet.

“I'll just nip down to the corner store for spare vacuum tubes.”

“STFU,” he said, picking up another stapled paper stack, “and RTFM.” He sailed it across the big table at me. It fluttered like a forlorn dove as it flew past.

“I'm not asking for the fucking Hilton, here. Don't they have a _Double-Tree?_ ”

“That brings us to the operational plan,” the big man's baritone boomed commandingly. He clicked to the next slide, revealing the floor plan of a large stadium. “After last year's incident at the concert hall, we've ensured our people are in direct control of the venues cameras, power, lighting and communications, both remotely and with on-site personnel. However, it's highly unlikely that we'll have another enemy willing to let the crowd go, like last time.” The laser pointer in his projector remote picked out the four tunnel-like entrances into the stands. “We've worked in emergency concealment agents into the usual fireworks displays, so our on-stage operatives don't have to worry about the crowd, but evacuating the civilians without casualty will be difficult given the natural access choke-points.”

I tried to recline in the rickety folding chair I was sitting in, but had to settle for working the kink out of my spine. “What's the expected threat, anyways?”

“For you?” The big man fixed me with a serious Look. “Alca-noiseu.”

I blinked. “Afuckinwhatnow?”

“If I gave you a pack of crayons with your briefing packets,” the Dan growled, “would you at least page _through_ the fucking things?”

“Wait, Jesus,” I snapped irritably. “They're the...” I twirled a finger in air to stir my memory - “those _other_ kaleidoscope psychedelic wonk-wonk motherfuckers, right?”

“This isn't one of your family's parent-teacher conferences,” the Dan muttered.

Mr. Lion Mane blinked, his face a passive mask for almost a full second before he rallied and pressed on. “The Alca-Noise are similar to normal Noise, but are summoned to this dimension through alchemical means, rather then heretical technology.”

“Yeah, cool, alchemy,” I sighed. “But these _are_ the same freakshows that powerfucked their way through Iwakuni last year, right?”

“No,” the big man intoned with a shake of his head. “The attack on Iwakuni were normal Noise. Alca-Noise have weaker phase-barriers, which makes them vulnerable to conventional weapons.”

I blinked. “Like guns?”

“Guns, blades, high explosives, napalm-”

“And this has been demonstrated?”

“During the attacks in Tokyo and Yokosuka last su-”

I settled into my chair with a sight. “Which was _also_ a powerfucking. Fantastic.”

“Nonetheless, they _can_ be destroyed,” the big man insisted. “But we cannot employ heavy weapons indiscriminately with civilians nearby, nor could we conceal that many heavily-armed troops. Therefore we are utilizing our most talented agents to guard the entrances.” The laser pointer flicks again. “I will cover the north-east entrance. Ogawa is covering the north-west. Fujitaka and Tomosato are leading our new plainclothes rapid response team at the south-east entrance. And you-” the laser pointer flicked again - “will cover the south-west.”

I closed my eyes, pinched the bridge of my nose, and tapped my half-full coffee cup against my knee. “That's it?”

“Essentially,” the big man's voice intoned seriously, “yes.”

“Great,” I murmured, plucking one of the small metal models off the old map table - something that looked like a small dinosaur. “Hup!” I flicked it in a high arc towards the big man, who caught it deftly. He examined it for a second, and finding nothing of note, gave me a quizzical glance.

I reclined in my creaky chair and spread my hands to frame the scene. “Everything the dust covers is our kingdo-”

“Wrong movie,” The Dan said curtly.

I was still turning towards him when something the exact color and approximate mass of a school bus hit me in the chest. I flipped ass-over-folding-chair, landing on the concrete a second before the Tokyo phone book did.

“Phoooone hoooome,” the Dan intoned without looking up from his paperwork.

I levered my way up with the table's edge, waving away the copious dust cloud the ancient tome had expelled upon impact. The big man was giving me a Serious Look.

“Aw, don't be like-” I sneezed - “like that, as long as nobody throws shit at me I can-” another sneeze - “sit with _both_ thumbs up my ass like a champ!”

He made no reply - simply staring at me, his eerily amber eyes solemn and unblinking. His visage was neither stern nor scowling, just... studious. I held his gaze long enough to feel annoyed by it, and was just drawing breath for a comment about pictures lasting longer when he clicked his remote again.

The image behind him leaped into smears of frantic motion, almost indecipherable but eerily familiar. It was several seconds in before I recognized the Google logo on the beam saber's hilt flashing past the camera, more by color than shape; X-shaped slashes in the iron door glowing molten-red a heartbeat before I kicked them in. I twitched involuntarily as the Nazi lunged at me, sword glinting silvered and swift, and watched my recorded hand finish the muscle-memory movements; two quick twirls from the wrist, one to beat away the point, the second coming around for a number-two diagonal cut downwards -

\- the big man was still studying me. I tore my eyes from the screen and locked gazes again. “Not _letterboxed?”_

He studied a moment more - and then broke into a smile that fit his lionesque visage better than I would've thought possible - and then he was moving, gathering his papers up. “You'll be in touch?” he asked The Dan.

“Uh? Yeah, yeah, what's the secure app of the friggin week you guys're using?” he queried, making vague motions at me like dispelling a bad smell. I wandered out, stuffing the rest of my bagel into my face as I scooped up the briefing packet he'd thrown at me. Flopping it between my hands aimlessly, I wandered down the bare concrete hall a ways before coasting to a halt.

There really wasn't much to do.

I tossed the packet over my shoulder and went looking for my cot.

***

The vast ceiling of the Tokyo Dome seemed to be buoyed by the excited murmurings of tight-packed thousands, their enthusiasm charging the air. The wide ball field was a sea of dancing lights waved by a restless audience; interrupted only by the elevated runway platforms leading through the crowd and the wide rectangle of the stage proper. It was clearly a sold-out crowd - 46,000 in the stands alone, not counting on the FieldTurf itself - and they all seemed thrilled to be there.

Including Geo, of course. I heard him elbowing his way through the crowd with his best anime-accented “gomenesai,” checking seat numbers and looking around in confusion. I stood up and waved.

“HEY, GEO!”

He turned and stared at the huge foam hand oscillating back and forth, then followed the arm down to my face. Everyone inside thirty feet had ceased waving their green glo-sticks and were starting at us, a little bubble of conspicuous silence growing. Geo sulked through the cold looks and took the seat next to mine gingerly. I plopped down in my own and grinned at him. “Why the long face, bub?”

He scowled at my giant foam hand and my fully-loaded, in-use beer helmet in turn, and cracked his glowstick with more thoughtful malice than strictly necessary. “This is why /k/ is a containment board,” he muttered.

“What's that, now? More of your internet autism forums?”

“You know damn well what it is, asshole, I saw you on the Bosnia op-” he pantomimed playing an accordion.

“Wait, how do you know their memes if it's a filthy containment board?”

“Fuck _you,_ ” he said with real feeling. “Just try to enjoy something for once instead of being an asshole.”

“I intend to,” I said, reaching behind my back to produce an air horn. Geo dove for it, horror on his face, and we tussled for a few seconds before he managed to pry my fingers off it, one by one. Clutching it under his arm, he raised his glowstick like a weapon - than shrank as the giggles started, the weight of many eyes pressing him deeper into his seat.

“I fucking hate you,” he growled.

“Aw, don't be so harsh, Little John!” I hissed through a sharp smile. “My men are _merry,_ aren't they? Merry as fuck. We're all fucking _merry_ here.”

The air rose with elated cries as the first performers emerged. I squinted, expecting to catch the faint shimmer of a sequined dress - but instead, the faintly familiar growl of two-stroke, two cylinder came drifting over the tumult. One of the engines rose in a bright scream, heralding a blue and white dirtbike's airborne entrance from stage right, landing at the far edge of the platform.

I rolled my eyes through the raucous cheering. “Is that the dog, or the pony?”

“That's not Tsubasa,” Geo said, voice sliding towards a snigger.

Another dirtbike came flying across the stage from the other direction, and then they were coming in pairs, criss-crossing right in front of the huge screen now displaying some flashy anime bullshit. Next came the backflips, and _that_ brought the crowd to their feet - and me a moment later, once Geo got a good grip on my hair, the wiry little bastard.

“NOW YOU CAN WAVE IT!” Geo smirked. I bapped his face with the foam finger and sucked at my beer cans defiantly. This carried on for a bit - long enough for me to remember I had a job and do a few cursory scans of the crowd - until the crowd started going truly apeshit, glo-sticks blurring the faint dots into a fuzzy sea of spastic glee. Somewhere at the edge of the green stage-lighting, I caught a hint of yellow.

An oddly familiar shade of yellow-

\- Geo's high-pitched squeal of sadistic glee faded into the crowd as the short schoolbus rolled sedately out of the shadows, borne upon a lifted suspension and four massive tires. The dirtbike riders had all lined up on stage -

“TWO BOMBS WERE NOT ENOUGH!” I screamed through cupped hands as the short bus accelerated with a mighty roar of an engine reshaped by some beastly madman. Snorting smoke and thunder, it hit the ramp and soared through the air as if the earth itself was repelled by the rolling atrocity. It cleared the dirtbikes -all twelve - and landed on its rear wheels at the edge of the platform. With the mighty snarl of a downshifting engine, the bus lurched forward on its gargantuan tires just enough to pitch the nose almost straight up - and then, teetering on the edge of the platform, it started backing up, lurching forward again every three feet or so as the nose began to fall. The dirtbikes scattered in a flurry of bright screaming two-cylinders as the bus driver backed the _thing_ to the center of the stage, and finally let it fall, the front tires hitting the hollow stage platform with a resonant _boom_ that signaled the first beat of the base line.

As the performers swung out of the cabin and the massive telescreen zoomed in on their form-fitting jumpsuits, Geo started shaking me wildly, his cackling, unholy glee somehow carrying through the deafening hooting of the fans. I buried my face in my foam hand as I discarded the beer helmet.

The music was solid and the singers smooth, voices blending into a slick harmony that slid off me without effect. Everyone had shot to their feet, cheering and waving their glo-sticks with gusto, so I just reclined in my seat and stared at the distant white ceiling as the incomprehensible lyrics crooned on and on. The first song finished in a flourish of sweeping colored spotlights, and for two minutes the applause raged on and on as I checked my phone - which had a single text message from The Dan telling me to put my fucking phone away and pay attention. I sighed, stood up and looked around for him with half a mind to chuck it at his damned head.

I happened to be looking right at the spot when it happened; a ripple in the air, then a tear as something - no, some _one -_ stepped into existence midair over center field. I did a double-take on their apparel and revised to some _thing._ A great uncertain susurration flowed through the crowd as the newcomer drew a spear out of thin air in a kaleidoscopic shimmer of rainbow light and flourished it through a spin before striking a pose. Chest swelling with a deep breath, they opened their mouth just in time to eat a fist moving at Mach Three.

The audience stared at the smoking hole in the big screen behind the stage, the contrail of yellow-orange light still fading in their retinas, and promptly went _nuts._ Glo-sticks were being whipped around fiercely enough to make me duck a little even before the newcomer and their assailant crashed through the screen onto center stage in a brawl so fierce it was little more than a colorful blur; orange-yellow versus blue-white. The dustup rolled under the bottom of the monster-bus, both combatants signing lusty and loud, voices almost overpowering the speaker-amped performers, who were _also_ singing - and all of it backed by the psychotic cheering of the crowd.

I watched the imbroglio for maybe thirty seconds before clapping my hands over my ears, sidling down the aisle and under flailing glo-sticks, and down the stairs to the entrance tunnel. The headache-inducing cacophony died out as I neared the outer structure, where countless souvenir shops and overpriced eateries ringed the stadium. Coasting to a halt near a row of vending machines set into a wall alcove. I scanned the foreign lettering, sighed, and settled on a can of something orange.

Japan's done amazing things with vending machines; producing places where hot, _canned_ coffee can be bought right next to canned beer, all with a single large-denomination coin - the most convenient country on earth to be shambling drunk in at 2AM. But even their legendary Asiatic autism can't solve the stuck-can conundrum. I watched the orange soda wedge against the glass, just above the dispenser bin, and with a muttered malediction I bent over to smack the plexiglass -

\- soda and shattered glass gushed over my back as a heartstopping **BANG** kicked in my eardrums, followed by three more as I fired my pistol behind me, upside down, before I realized I'd drawn it. I twisted and dove in one motion, thrusting the front sight onto the silhouette of -

\- Noise, psychedelic and translucent and already crumbling around the edges as I emptied the magazine into it from ten yards, smoking brass and thunderous reports rolling down the wide hall. Pushing up onto my knees as I flipped the empty magazine out of the gun, onto my feet as the reload went in and the slide dropped, coming up in a two-handed Weaver as the next one walked through a nearby shop's security shutters.

That eternal instant, Noise pivoting its curled whip-arms towards me as my left heel slid across the polished concrete, knowing the dice were already cast -

\- the whips snapping towards my eyes as I fired thrice in the same heartbeat, muscle memory riding the trigger reset -

\- and I was still alive, sitting on my right foot and aiming over my extended left leg, but the Noise was already crumbling into gray carbon. Two-six-ten- _lots_ were emerging from the walls and shuttered storefronts, _wonk-wonking_ as they turned to form vague ranks - facing me.

I was already wrestling the grenade out of my jacket with one hand while shooting with the other to keep them busy. I popped the pin, let the spoon fly off and hurled it underhand, the can bouncing and rolling down the hall as I dove for the narrow gap between the last vending machine and the alcove wall, which some enterprising asshole had filled with a fake ficus. Wrestling with the plastic leaves, I tried a calm, measured six-count and reached twenty-five before it went off.

I tried leaning back for a peek without exposing my ass and ended up tumbling out of the narrow gap, still tangled with the ficus. The Noise were carbonized - and so was everything else within eight yards of the thermobaric-incendiary grenade's detonation. I kicked my way free of the fucking ficus, fumbling a new magazine into the pistol. The air reeked of smoke and cordite and carbonized drinks, the vending machines popping and sparking where the Noise's tentacles had slashed through them. Holstering my pistol, I staggered through the soda-slick floor and rolling cans till I found an orange one.

Through the smoldering fires and drifting smoke-haze behind me came the sound of footsteps, clacking crisp against the concrete - and the odd _wonka-wonka_ of more Noise. I popped the tab and chugged half in one go - adrenaline has a way of making you thirsty - before turning to the new threat.

I saw the garish Noise on either side before I saw her - a slim figure wreathed in flowing white-gray silks that seemed to merge and flow like the acrid phosphorus smoke. I shrugged off my jacket (juggling my soda from hand to hand) and rolled my shoulders. Taking a wide stance, I let my hand dangle near the .45 as the woman and her amorphous outfit hove out of the smoke.

“Weellll,” I drawled, “I'm yer Huckleberry b- _uh?_ ”

There wasn't time to be surprised - just the sudden thump against my side, and she was _there,_ glossy dark hair tickling my face, a flowery fragrance, her soft fingers gripping my left bicep -

\- and then I was alone, the Noise waddling past me on either side as I looked down at the growing numbness and saw orange soda mingling with the blood gushing from the gaping hole in my side. The floor jumped up to hit me before I'd fully realized I'd been run through, the blood pressure drop yanking the rug out from under my consciousness. As my vision tinged black, my cheek lying in sticky soda and blood, I saw the woman walking away with the same measured pace, like she'd never broken stride.

You're supposed to see your life flashing before your eyes, I guess; all that you loved, all that you'll miss.

All I saw was that last can of orange soda spilling over the concrete.

All the rest was

“ **LEMON - FUCKING -** _ **LIME-!**_ **”**

She whirled like a dervish, silks flowing about her like a ghostly shield, just in time to catch the Mountain Dew Machine in the face. Smoke and citrus soda spewed everywhere as the machine smashed her into the floor. A flash of darkness down its middle, and the smoking wreckage fell away to each side, the woman darting out in time to see me hoisting a hot-coffee machine over my head.

“ **YOU DARE TURN YOUR BACK ON THE CAFFEINE KING!?”** I bellowed as I hurled the huge machine at her face.

[There's a](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6BbvCC0VI0)[ _sound_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6BbvCC0VI0)[ when you're in it, violent rhythm surging and flowing with the pulse of combat.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6BbvCC0VI0) If syncopation is staggering from bar to bar, this was savagery from blow to blow, leaning into the fight, every strike heavy and hard. I followed the vending machine in as she slashed it in half, plowing inside her guard before she could reverse and slamming my forehead into her face. I emptied the gun, _waiting_ for it to cycle and raging at the delay - and then catching the shadowy sword-blade on the trigger guard. The bayonet was _in_ my off-hand as I countered, as if conjured from my belt by the very thought of it. She backpedaled for distance, the curved length of her blade so dark against the flowing silks of her garment it seemed like flickering light and shadow; the wicked edge always seeming to spring from where it shouldn't be.

I waded in with both hands whirling, a defensive figure-eight that batted away her strikes with more force than art. I could corner her, _had_ to since she had the reach, and she knew it too. She gave quicker than I'd thought, vanishing in a swirl of silks - and I was right behind her, sailing through the air with one massive leap. Her guard was out of position, blade twirling in from a wide hanging guard to smash into my bayonet's crossguard as I swung the butt of Baker's pistol at her temple. She ducked it, the magazine grazing her nose - and I reversed my elbow into her chin before we hit the ground, rolling and skidding along the floor.

The Noise hit me from all sides, before I could find my feet, tentacles and claws wrapping around my arms. One sharp jerk slammed their translucent hides into each other with so much force they squished together like jello before exploding like stomped grapes. A third skidded between me and my quarry and promptly popped like a balloon when the pistol's butt slammed its oddly-shaped head down into its multihued torso.

The shock on the swordswoman's face was plain enough that I actually paused for a moment, heaving for air, body burning.

“... _how!?”_ she demanded.

“ **NANOMACHINES, HON!”** I bellowed, and _charged._

I never saw the spell - just the long sharp shadow flitting 'bout her head before _something_ hit me like a wall - an _actual_ wall, concrete cracking as I bounced off it and across the floor. I sensed the follow-up tearing through the air towards me before PDS engaged with the familiar thudding WHAM! of overpressure blast. I staggered upwards and _moved,_ the shadowy darts shifting to lead me and plowing into the swarms instead, expiring in bright heavy **wham! wham! wham!** as I loaded my last magazine and reversed course, triggering the rest of my swarms at once, a bright wall of explosions blistering the air with light and sound, blinding her for a split-second as I made my rush, legs burning fit to blaze as I dumped everything I had into them, accelerating like a missile. She saw me coming in time to guard, flickering shadowy sword flashing out as the pistol thundered - she'd felt the lead last time, clean through her barriers magic or metaphysical - keeping her busy until I closed, gun locking open a heartbeat before I engaged her blade, commanding it with the bayonet's crossguard as I rode my momentum forward and pressed it back into a clinch. She was already swirling away again, trying to gain distance, so I struck out and seized a handful of swirling silk, yanking her closer, for a few heartbeats longer -

\- and then the bitch _threw_ me, ass-over-teakettle, flames and concrete and sparking florescent lights whirling through my vision before I slammed into a hot dog stand face-first, cold beef juice and broken plywood plastering me.

I triggered the last swarm.

The shockwave hit a second later, a deafening cacophony of clattering cookware accompanying a sudden rain of hot dogs as the freezer's door sprung open. I reached under the grill, found a pipe and _twisted_ it off even as I surged to my feet and smashed my shoulder through the door. She was alive of course, form-fitting outfit burnt, beguiling silk-wisps mostly scorched away, grim hate shining through the blood trickling down her face as she advanced on me, weapon raised and ready.

I staggered 'round to face her, twirling the copper gas pipe easily in my hand - I'd lost my weapons mid-air. Her wary gaze flicked from the gaping wound where she'd run me through to the pipe to my eyes. A _nasty_ smile crept over my face at that - she didn't know, _couldn't._ Hang the wounds and hang the weapons - all I needed now was _power,_ and I had plenty to spare, pulsing sharp and hot through along my bones as the _sound_ built towards the crescendo.

“Come on, bitch,” I hissed, pipe twirling with a lazy grace that belied my staggering stance. “What are you waiting for? **COME ON!** ”

She actually hesitated for a moment longer, analyzing - and then she was charging, swift and sure-footed, cautious but not cringing, intent on pressing her advantage and finishing me. The rampaging thunder of my heart hammering in my ears finally overpowered everything else, limbs twitching as I pointed the pipe at the onrushing enemy - and unleashed it.

***

Never high-five a freight train.

***

The _sound_ strung it together, carrying me through the smear of impact and pain and sheer sensory chaos, a simple bass rumble in my soul. Hitting a wall at fifty miles per hour isn't shabby, but a ten-tesla EM pulse fucks you up _real_ good. For long moments I lay there listening to myself unfiltered - galloping heartbeat underpinning the staggering surging feedback song of the autonomics, shivering through my nerves to ricochet through my brain -

- _song?_

Reality faded back to high-resolution as the AR overlay flickered on, reading out a lot of shit I already knew - but my ears were working again, and now I could pick out song from sound, the voice bright, bold and belligerent as hell. Or maybe it was the accompaniment of cyclic-rate automatic fire lending that impression. I got up - ripping myself out of demolished 2x4s and drywall as I did so - and found myself in what was left of a darkened baseball souvenir shop. I'd demolished most of the team-logo mugs on my way in, and some of the damn things were still in my back, from the feel of it.

I was staggering for the door when the boyish brown-haired innocent from yesterday - the ProtoDan - appeared at the hole in the shop's window-wall. The SIG in his right hand balanced with the businessman-like bag in his left, leaving him a net disappointment.

He sized me up in a half-second, and shook his head. “We're leaving.”

I tried flipping him the bird, but my left arm wasn't working, so I just went to shove him out of the way. There was a brief flicker of shadow, and quite suddenly my arm was twisted behind my back, the ProtoDan ushering me along like a polite upper-class bouncer.

I felt the sudden surge of violence screaming through my nerves, that gathering potential that electrifies the air before it's made manifest in the muscle - and then it happened. I never sensed her, but he _did;_ shoving me clear, twisting about and firing in one fluid motion. I turned in time to see her freeze mid-lunge - then _melt_ into shadow that fell towards the floor with the impetus of a waterfall, momentum sloshing across the darkened shop to rise again in the shadows cast by a rack of faux team jerseys. I never saw ProtoDan move - just heard the sharp reports of his P220 as he gained some distance - but she was done fucking around. A single flick of her vantablack-blade and every shadow in the shop rose as one dark tide and slammed against the remaining full-length window, blasting the razor-sharp shards towards him like a shotgun blast.

The violence was still gathering in me, my one good fist weighing heavier by the second as I gathered the last of my swarms and energy behind the blow-to-be, letting the power surges in my system resonate and build. She was coming now, heeled shoes crushing the glass shards underfoot as she strode towards me with measured pace, blade rising for the final strike. I gathered myself behind that blow, trembling with impatience, the _sound_ galloping and straining towards impact-

\- the glinting blade tumbling towards me, the explosion of every trembling muscle in-synch -

\- and the Silence hit.

That, was everything, and all. Not the shadow-master, not the bright steel sword that'd I'd just snatched from midair - but the Silence. Even the steady thunder of my overtaxed heart had vanished, and now there was just the enemy, staring at me down three feet of silvered steel.

Quite suddenly, it all seemed pretty simple.

She used the shadow-trick again, but there were only so many pools to pick from, and she came out of the nearest one, to my right, outside of my guard - had I not shifted a half-step, putting her at optimal range. She had to launch into an aggressive combination, trying to beat away my blade and get inside my longer reach, but economic parries kept her from exploiting her swifter, lighter weapon much - she wielded a tulwar, I could see now, and wasn't eager for a thrusting duel with a longer saber. I'd taught her respect and seen her caution - I knew where this was going.

She closed, clinched - without fear, seeing my useless off-hand - was thrown back by my strong right (the impregnable autonomics, threaded through muscle and knit with bone,) and then we circled for a few heartbeats, both looking for obstacles we might force the other against. Finding nothing, I waited for the inevitable -

\- and there it was, the swordswoman springing towards me in an almost impossibly swift lunge, counting on speed and superior condition to force my hand. She darted left, then came right towards me in a reversal that defied physics, flicking in with her blade already twirling in for a number-one cut, diagonal down from my left. If I thrusted at her she'd twist into the blow and beat aside, plowing inside my guard with a backhand-six or even the elbow, so I parried with a high quarte, crossing my body and catching it on the crossguard. I flowed into the riposte even before the light blow on my blade confirmed my suspicions - she'd under-committed, squandering the charge's momentum to allow a swift roll of the wrist into a number-five cut under my hilt -

\- but I was already lunging, throwing my weight behind my elbow as I planted it in her face.

 _She_ went flying this time, sprawling over the debris-strewn floor. I declined to follow - it'd be sticking my foot in a bear-trap, in my state - and simply waited, en guarde, for her to rise.

She gave me one last searing look, eyes burning like coals - and then she was gone, flowing into the devastated remains of the stadium's outer hall like she'd never been.

I stood there a moment, staring after her, frozen in my guard - until I noticed my breathing again, slipping into my consciousness with Sound again. My heartbeat came next, and then the aches and pains, all filtering in - but muted, distant -

\- I dropped the blade like it was burning me, and the sharp clatter of steel on concrete brought the Sound crashing back in all at once, including -

“-you hear me, you thick-skulled Yankee?”

I blinked, and turned, to find a white-haired girl with a pissed-off expression located somewhere inside the heaviest, most awkward-looking headgear this side of Dark Helmet I'd seen. Her eyes widened as she took me in - three kinds of soda drying sticky on my face, hair half-soaked with watered-down hot-dog grease, and a few plastic ficus leaves glued to my hair by blood for good measure.

I scowled back. “The fuck are _you_ looking at, toot-sweet?”

***

Absolutely everyone and everything went fucking insane after that, but I just sat there, dripping blood, staring at the sword.

ProtoDan - Ogawa, that is - had thrown it to me, of course. It'd been in his bag. Why, I didn't know - and scarcely cared. I'd found a few surviving cans of lukewarm coffee and sat there sipping them as every policeman in Tokyo and suits of every sort swarmed around the place like locusts. It was noise, noise, _noise,_ the chaos of lots of busy people doing their businesslike things, and a large part of me wanted to bend over and pick up the heavy, wire-wrapped hilt of the saber.

Just to check.

SONG's rapid response reaction... _whatever_ had found and returned Baker's pistol and The Bayonet already, but aside from that I was left pretty much alone till Geo found me. Waving his hand before my face for my attention, he gestured at my right arm impatiently.

I curled the coffee can close and jerked my head at the shattered front of the vending machine I was sitting on. “Get yer own!”

Seizing my non-functional left arm with a scowl, he drew one of the backup nanite cylinders and slammed it into my biceps with far more force than necessary. I winced - the system could shut off its own wiring, but my own flesh-and-blood feedback could only be electrochemically dampened so much. “Gee, thanks, Doc.”

He just drew another cylinder, his scowl deepening.

“Isn't one en-OW!” I snarled as he jabbed this one into my _right_ bicep, giving me the full unpleasant experience. “The fuck was that for!?”

“Not supposed to put two injections into the same spot,” he muttered. “And you have a hole through your _fucking liver,_ so no, it's not enough.” He drew a third. I tossed back the last of my can, bounced it off his forehead for a distraction, and dove for the syringe. We tussled.

“ **YOU!”**

Me and Geo froze - the voice had been young and feminine, but the undercurrent of restrained violence was eerily similar to The Dan, and that never failed to get one's attention. A (white!?) haired young woman in a shoulderless red dress was stalking towards us with murder in her eyes.

“ **YOU ARROGANT CARELESS ASSHOLE MORON!”**

Geo and I traded uncertain glances, hands still curled around the nanite injector.

“ **YOU!”** she roared, her voice fairly shaking, and reached out to seize me by the collar of my abused jacket with one hand, her other already drawing back in a fist. “ **FUCKING BASTA** - **”** her jaw clicked shut as the muzzle of the old pistol hit the bottom of her chin.

“Go ahead, bitch,” I said, the hammer clicking crisply as I thumbed it back. “Whistle fucking dixie at me.”

That's about when Geo - the godless son of a whore - slammed the third injector into my ass. The nanites are injected with some charged bio-electric gel so they can start first-aid even if your own reserves are dry. My spine lit up like a fucking Christmas tree, and my legs simply went limp. The angry girl kept me upright via my collar and was bringing her fist towards my face when someone came up behind her and caught her wrist. Our respective “friends” dragged us apart as we spat and cursed at one another.

Red-dress started kicking her feet wildly, forcing my would-be savior to bend backwards and lift her clear of the floor. She windmilled for a few seconds, swearing profusely in Japanese, then switched back to somewhat-accented English. “YOU WEREN'T DOING JOB! YOU LEFT!”

I stared at her blankly, unable to wrestle Geo much down an arm and torn up besides. “Wut.”

That prompted another torrent of angry Japanese and a look so dark it damn near stopped my heart. She twisted away from her friend - a tall redhead in a jumpsuit of some sort - and stormed away, hands curled into fists. The redhead gave me a rather cool look of her own before following.

“You were _supposed_ to be guarding the tunnel entrance, remember?” Geo snarled, dropping me. I landed on my ass - spine still tingling, damn him - and just leaned back against the battered vending machine, reaching back and over to fish out another coffee. “Yeah, yeah.”

“They summoned Noise at every tunnel entrance,” Geo snapped. “You weren't there to take care of yours.”

“Oops,” I muttered, struggling to pop the tab one-handed. I'd put the last can between my knees, but of course, that was out for a few minutes more.

“People almost _died,_ you fucking-”

“But the sparklebints saved 'em, right?”

Geo's face turned dark.

I managed to get my thumb under the tab and popped the can open. Geo stalked away, hands opening and closing over and over.

Fuck 'im, I thought, and drank my coffee.

“Please don't mind her,” a familiar bass rumble advised from my side. The vending machine's tortured frame creaked as the lion-maned man in the red shirt, salmon-colored tie tucked into the breast pocket, settled his impressive bulk next to me. He popped the tab on a scavenged beer can in his big mitt.

I shrugged. “Was she wrong?”

“Yes.”

He downed half the can in one gulp and gave me an appraising glance. “I was watching every security camera from the ops center, you know.”

A moment of silence.

“... sooooooooo....?” I invited.

“That woman you were fighting was filling the entire outer hall with Noise,” he pointed out. “There wouldn't have been anywhere to evacuate to.”

“Oh,” said. “I guess.”

He finished his can and crushed it contemplatively. “You don't care.”

“She got away.”

“Could you have taken her?”

“Nope.”

He leaned forward, elbows on knees, and peered at the wire-wrapped hilt of the heavy, silvered saber lying before us. I know he hadn't seen the conclusion of the fight; the EMP of my party trick had fried every integrated circuit in a hundred yards.

“It doesn't matter,” I stated.

He glanced askance at me, brow furrowed quizzically.

I drained my coffee can and tossed it over my shoulder. “I scrapped with that bitch for, I don't think it was four minutes, all told. I had about seven or eight, tops, the rate I was going. And that's just the thermodynamic limit. Blew most of my PDS swarms under her ass - fuel-air explosive blast, should've liquefied 'er. And the rest I fried with that pipe trick - sucked my bioelectric dry, too. “And then - that.” I flipped my hand at the sword. “Very nice, legendary weapon, mystic powers, woo-hoo, just like these,” I said, waving the bayonet, “and it doesn't mean jack shit.” I tossed the blade aside. “All that and I can't manage one-tenth what _they_ do by holding hands and singing some fucking j-pop.”

He shook his head. “A man's limits-”

“I'm not fucking finished, pal. You know why I'm fuckin here? Because there's a ninety-eight percent rejection rate for nano-augs without years of pharmochemical enhancement and physical prep and I won the genetic fuckin lottery, that's why. And that's it. So whatever the fuck you're all doing, whoever shadowslut was, _whatever._ Yesterday it was fucking Vampire Nazis from the Moon, tomorrow it'll be Communist Zombie Aardvarks. Fuck that, fuck this and fuck _you.”_ I staggered up from the vending machine, jamming the bayonet into my belt as I went, and started limping for the exit.

They let me go, for whatever that's worth when they've got a radio link to your cerebellum. I was away from the natter, the questions, the inevitable endless fucking aftermath of _who_ and _what_ and _why_ and _lets debrief over this_ and _I'd like you to meet Twintails McWhistlebitch_ I knew was coming. Rubbing my filthy face, I focused on my breathing and kept my eyes on the floor, kicking debris out of my way as my mind kept looping back, again and again, to that moment the sword-hilt touched my hand, to the moment _it_ fell upon the world like a veil, that blessed release -

\- that _silence._


	2. VOLUME ONE, PART TWO - PAX SYMPHOGEAR

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get worse.

There was a lot of pointless trouble on my account, afterwards.

Medivac to Yokosuka medical, complete with my own Marine posse, followed by a few doctors trying to cram fully-redacted x-ray prints down some Navy intel geek's throat. No dinner, which was bad, then hospital-food breakfast, which was worse. Medical specialists and vendor techs flew in from the states to buzz in a jet-lagged jumble around my hospital bed, all pretending it was for my benefit. A debrief, emphasis on brief.

And after that,

                       there was the waiting.

You can only sleep so long, unaided, and the nanites don't brook sleepy pills - not that the bastards would give me any, anyways. I held out for two days - I had Nethack and a few Fire Emblem games on my phone - but the food finally drove me to the surface. The Crypt's amenities totaled two hot plates and a microwave, and the pantry was mostly ancient MREs.

So despite my deep disgust, I found myself riding the rickety elevator up to the alleged cafe once more. The doors dinged annoyingly loud before parting with creak-and-clatter enough to wake the dead. The small service hallway was deserted, however, so I still had some hope as I crept across and gingerly eased the swinging double-doors open -

“WELCOME HOME, MASTER!” a chorus of voices called out in varying degrees of English. I found myself staring down the cafe's entire damn staff, first row kneeling before the second, all of them in the Default Maid Pose like a fetish firing squad.

I froze, as if their vision was based on movement - and then very, very slowly, eased the double doors closed again.

I heard the clickety-clacking cacophony of their Mary Janes on the linoleum before they burst through the doors in a two-tone tide of unstoppable horror. I leaped for the elevator, punching the call button frantically, but the wheezy old equipment was too slow. They were upon me instantly, dainty hands plucking at my tattered clothes and pulling me into the crush. They moved as one, forceful enough to propel me but too gently to justify dynamic resistance. I fumed my way into the faux diner and to a corner booth, glowering at the maids removing the condiment bottles from the table before I could seize them and dual-wield my way clear of this _bullshit._

I scooted to the furthest corner of the long curved seat, but this just made room for maids to sidle in after me, hedging me in. I crossed my arms and glowered at the ringleader - a tall young woman in a maid outfit consisting entirely of Rhodesian camouflage, complete with a tactical “kilt” and a slung airsoft FAL. She leaned over to give me a good look down her low-cut blouse, gloved hands splayed on the table, and gave me a sultry look.

“Welcome home, Master,” she said with a faint British accent.

“Who put you up to this?” I demanded.

“Ara ara~” she said with a sultry wink. “You want to play 'interrogate the prisoner,' eh? Who do you work for?”

“It was Dan, wasn't it.”

A flurry of stifled titters confirmed it.

“That son of a bitch,” I growled. “That dirty-rotten two-faced son of a bitch.”

“So,” she continued as the maids on either side shuffled closer, “what can we do for you, Master?”

About twelve variations of “fuck off and die in a fire” leaped for my tongue and logjammed in my throat, giving my stomach enough time to weigh in with a groan.

“A menu, then,” said the Rhodesia ringleader, conjuring one from beneath her skirt via means mysterious. Accepting it, I flipped it open with a thumb and scowled at the poor machine-translated English beneath the chicken scratches. “Right... Oden... Curry udon.... chicken katsu...”

I looked up at Rhodesia Ranger sullenly. “I have no idea what any of this shit is.”

“An omelet, then,” she said authoritatively. “Nobody hates omelets.” She snapped her fingers and a maid at the periphery of the pack scampered off to the kitchen, cosplay cat tail trailing behind. “Now, while we wait - shall we play a game?”

“Global Thermonuclear War?” I suggested sullenly, tossing the menu back at her.

The ambient temperature dropped about ten degrees in two heartbeats.

“Too soon?” I drawled, but Rhodesia lass just gave me a sultry smirk -

\- and that's when the one on my right slipped her arm through mine, cradling it in her bosom, leaning close enough for her maid headdress to tickle my cheek as she brought her other hand up.

“Clever girl,” I muttered as she began the routine.

“Love love,” she giggled, doing a chicken-wing motion. “Moe, moe,” folding and unfolding her hand next to her bunny-ears headband (somehow sharing space with the headdress.) “Rock, scissors, paper-” she illustrated each - “one, two, three, go!” She flicked out scissors in perfect time with a wink-grin, like an idol doing the V thing.

She transitioned flawlessly into a puffed-cheek pout. “You didn't do anything!”

“The only winning move,” I intoned, “is not to play.”

“For real, this time!” she insisted, doing her routine and flipping out paper this time. I propped my head on my arm, fist-to-cheek, and stared at nothing in particular as she waved her hand in front of my eyes and tugged on my arm. I could hear the eggs sizzling in the kitchen, and realized with quiet misery that they probably wouldn't put cheese in it, because Japan. I closed my eyes against the cajoling group stare, leaving only the two-line Standby Mode sitrep glowing faintly in the dark - 63% charge, 40% system load, and 10:32 AM on the clock.

Which begged the question of why the whole damn staff was here this early and customer's weren't but _whatever._

The prodigal fucking omelet finally arrived, handed off through the crowd till it hit the table. I reached for it with my free hand, but the other maid intercepted it, deftly snatching the ketchup bottle out of midair as someone tossed it to her. “What design would you like?” she asked.

I blinked.

“Oh, I know!” she said, wielding the ketchup bottle with practiced ease as she started decorating the omelet like a baker applying frosting to a cake. With a few quick lines, she sketched out a cat face, paused after the whiskers to glance at me, then added a frowny mouth and angry eyebrows.

“Awesome, really captured the pathos of the feline condition, thanks,” I said, reaching for the fork - before the thrice-damned whore caught that hand too, clinging just enough to make me conscious of how petite she was. I tried to scrape her hand off with the table's edge, but she just let her hand slide down my forearm till she caught my palm, deftly twining her fingers with mine. I jerked away reflexively, but the other girl redoubled her grip and leaned in, trapping me between them.

“The fuck-” I began, trying to twist my hand free of hers, but she just leaned against me, resting her head on my shoulder. Her red tanuki-ears headband tickled my cheek as she gazed up at me through her dark, silky bangs, a shy, sweet smile playing on her pale lips. Squeezing my hand gently, she lifted her chin, limpid eyes sinking to half-mast as she closed in -

\- and slipped the forkful of omelet into a mouth I hadn't realized I'd opened, one warm brown eye giving me a cheeky wink.

I hadn't noticed my heart leap, but we heard it land with both feet when my jaw clicked shut. She tried to withdraw the fork, but it was already trapped between my teeth. That threw her off her slutty stride, but it was the low, throaty growl that really opened her heavy-lidded sexy-eyes wide. She leaned away and I leaned in, molars grinding as I bit back a full-out snarl, staring her down. She scooted away hastily, shaking her arm to disentangle it from mine. I let my stare push her back another foot or two as I slowly plucked the fork from my mouth, swallowing the egg absentmindedly. Gripping it in my fist, prongs-down, I swiveled my wrath onto the right-hand thot, which was enough to send her packing as well. Thus freed, I reeled in the plate, eyes flicking left-right-left at the Maid Brigade as I reversed my fork and slowly began to -

\- I paused on the first proper mouthful, and stared down at my plate in horror.

I swallowed.

“Rice.”

I carefully dissected the _thing_ on my plate.

“Under scrambled eggs.”

I lifted a gaze burdened by this terrible knowledge and it landed on the Maid Brigade with weight enough to push them back a few steps. I found myself staring down Rhodesia lass, who was looking mighty nonplussed. Her warm hazel eyes hardened, small shoulders stiffened - and then she crawled onto the goddamned table.

Her skirt was barely long enough to brush the formica even as she crawled across the tabletop, hazel eyes gazing through her silken bangs to pin me to the seat. Worn red vinyl creaked as I pressed back into the seat-cushions, but it was no use - she drew up her legs to kneel frog-legged, then swung them out over the table edge almost at the same time with remarkable flexibility. The heels of her Mary Janes sneaked through the gap between the seat and back cushions in a pincer attack, hooking behind my hips and pulling me closer with a strength I hadn't expected. Her legs were wrapped around me in a heartbeat; ankles crossed behind my back and knees drawn up behind my armpits. She'd picked up my plate at some point, and now it was the only thing holding down her camo-pattern skirt enough to conceal her panties -

\- her fingers curled under my chin, tilting my face up to smolder under her gaze. “We forgot the most important part,” she said, sliding her hand up to caress my cheek. “We forgot the love.”

Something hot and electric shivered through my veins for a breathtaking moment as my stomach backflipped into a knot. She formed her hands into a heart shape, holding them against her middle high enough to hike up her bosom. “Moe-ay, moe-ay,” she almost breathed, still holding my gaze. “Kyun~” she mimed pouring out her heart-hands onto the alleged omelet. “Moe-ay-”

“I'm not hungry anymore,” I said.

“Moe-uh?” she faltered, lidded eyes widening.

“Are you fucking deaf?” The unexpected bile burned my throat.

I felt her legs briefly shiver against my back. “What-”

The knot in my stomach had soured, burning sick in my belly. “GET OFF ME!”

She got, scuttling backwards across the table without any of the sultry grace evidenced in her advance. She scuttled faster when I stood up on my seat, tumbling backwards into the waiting arms of her thot brigade before I stalked over the table and hopped off the far end. The pack of maids parted like the Red Sea as I landed. They stared at me as I thought of something to say, and something else, and pretty soon I had a good rant building steam in my throat when I saw the shattered look on Rhodesia's face; shocked, sorrowful... and scared.

I spun on my heel and stormed out of the diner, _slamming_ the door behind me hard enough to rattle the frame.

I wasn't hungry anymore, anyway.

***

Tokyo was all sloppy discordant _noise._

American cities never leave you far from the rumble of major roads and the fulsome thunder of distant freeways, rivers of steel hurtling through wide canyons walled by glassy-faced skyscrapers shimmering in the sunlight - all moving with the steady rhythm of internal combustion.

Tokyo's all people, and all right in your ear, streaming over wide crosswalks and then the buildings squeeze over the sidewalks and press them all into your path, phone calls and fluttered flyers and A/C units and the odd taxi muttering slowly upstream like a tuna scattering minnows. A beehive without the buzz, cacophony without the clang, sound without beat, Nickelback off AutoTune, in a nutshell, _noise_.

I don't like cities, and I liked Tokyo even less.

I walked. Every building face blended together, a riot of garish signs screaming for attention till I turned off the Augmented Reality and let them fade into uniform gibberish. Storefronts spilled out racks and tables and uniformed hawkers into the street to ensnare the unwary, driving me towards the centerline. My stomach was still twisting round and round as my hindbrain played back that soft touch on my cheek, over and over.

I walked and the salarymen walked past me, scurrying in and out of eateries at double-time, some accosting vending machines as they bounced briefcases against their thighs with impatience. The air sang with the scents of foodstuffs; a bit like that greasy siren-song you sniff downwind of a McDonalds. I was still hungry, but I remembered that rice omelet and my stomach soured again.

I walked past pachinko parlors and glitzy arcades all dinging and blinging for my attention, past neon signs spelling themselves out in sequence and giant TV displays aglow with ads. This town wouldn't leave you alone even at night, but daylight favored the garish kaleidoscope of storefront signage in the narrow sidestreets, so there was no escape. I leaned against a lamppost for a moment's rest and found myself meeting Killy's flinty eyes, staring out from an advertising poster for the new anime. I snorted. An apt analogy, right down to the bullshit story slogging towards fucking nothing. I sighed and let my head fall back, staring up the pole at the dark clouds scudding over the city, bringing out the umbrellas and some blessed shade besides.

I closed my eyes, savoring the relieved ache of my legs, and waited for rain.

It was 12:43.

I missed the comforting pressure of the bayonet sheath against the small of my back, where I usually stuck it under my belt, outside the waistband. Hadn't planned to leave, after all. Just a cheap piece of mass-produced shit anyways, government-issue potmetal, but I kind of liked it for that. It'd _felt_ right the first time I drew it, in the Pine Barrens, a cheap tool for dirty work in the dark. A storm had been rolling in then, too, distant clouds backlit by staccato flashes of lightning before vanishing into the dark again, their looming presence felt in the wind rushing through the trees. This one was just slate-gray and sedate, only adding the occasional thunder-rumble to the city's background imbroglio -

\- which was now babbling rather loudly in my ear.

I turned to find a short girl with z-shaped hairclips in her sandy brown hair addressing me with the utmost sincerity and urgency, all in Japanese. I stared blankly as her face moved through a variety of emotions, ending with an earnest bow.

“...I'm not buying any cookies,” I said.

“Sorry,” someone said behind me. I twitched and lurched around to find another girl with long, dark hair tied into pigtails and a stony expression. “She's an idiot.” She directed some Japanese at her companion in a similar tone, prompting some sputtering protest, then turned her hard expression back onto me.

“I will translate,” she said crisply.

“Who the h-” I started, but she cut me off with a scowl so intense I actually shut up. Despite being barely five feet tall and maybe fifteen years old at the outside, she could've been The Dan's kid sister. Before I could recover, the sandy-haired one started in again, hazel eyes sparkling as she addressed me, hands clasped before her.

“I'm Tachibana Hibiki,” dark-hair intoned flatly, her auburn stare boring into me. “I'm one of your Japanese colleagues. It is very nice to meet you.”

Sandy was almost bouncing on the balls of her feet now, chattering animatedly.

“She heard how you helped Ogawa-san-” more chattering - “and protected all the things-” a double fist-pump now as all pretenses of polite formality fled, “and fought all the Noise, and that is-” dark-hair made the quotemarks audible - “good.”

“Uh,” I managed.

Dark-hair's eyelids were drooping with boredom, but it only focused her glare into a pinpoint beam as Sandy carried on, leaning in as she made her pitch. “As thanks-” Sandy's face turned up to the clouded sky, eyes closed in a moment of rapture - “she wants to treat you to ramen, and to introduce you to her friends.”

I shifted my gaze between them as I realized how neatly they'd penned me in from both sides, my back to a busy street. “Uh, no thanks, I'm good.”

Darkhair relayed this, and prompted a squeak of alarm from Sandy, who stammered and wrung her hands cutely and anooo'd and awa-wa-wa-wa'd and carried on in the most endearing fashion possible, all in apologetic-sounding Japanese.

Dark hair blinked slowly, exhaling fully before she opened her eyes again. “I am not repeating a word of that-” she said, a dour “bullshit” echoing in the undertone. “Your boss sent us.”

I froze. “He what-”

“He said not to let you out of sight,” she said, her fixed stare pinning me to the power pole, “as long as you're outside the safe-house.”

“And how the hell did you find me-”

“He told us.”

Realization dawned with the fizzy leading-edge forte of an oncoming fuck you as I scanned the sky, blinking as the AR flickered back in, high-contrast filters on. I found it a little past the telephone pole, heading away from the incoming stormfront - the faint, barely distinguishable silhouette of a Reaper drone.

“GORGON STARE at _this_ , you asshole,” I said as I flipped it the bird.

“Well, where are you going?” dark-hair demanded, impatience edging her tone.

 _Wherever I fucking want_ sprang to mind, but I said “depends on where The Dan isn't. He bother explaining why he can't be arsed to manage his own people?”

“He said he's going to be late,” Dark-Hair intoned. “Something about an argument between the Navy and Air Force over a drone.”

“... that. That's just _swell_ ,” I sighed, imagining The Dan rolling through the diner's doors like a pyroclastic flow. “Another sunny day in Pompeii.”

“Well?” she demanded again. “Where are we going?”

I glanced askance at her, sizing up her tiny frame, and then flicked my eyes down the wide terraced sidewalk, invitingly empty at the moment. Without blinking once, she slowly tugged at a cord around her neck to produce a small crystalline pendant with the air of someone lifting their coat to show a gun. “Where to?”

Somewhere between the sheer incongruous hilarity and my idle thoughts about bitch-slapping a fifteen-year-old girl, I felt my deep ambivalence tilt ever so slightly towards the idea of dinner _and_ a dork show. “Lunch sounds okay,” I said with a shrug.

Sandy took this as Yes without waiting for translation, bunnyhopping in place a few times before grabbing my wrist and trying to drag me along. She was surprisingly strong for her size, managing to make me lurch forward a step before I planted myself. “Yeah, how about no.”

She pouted at me and pointed at the sky.

“Then we'll get wet.”

Sandy frowned, then brightened, turning to chatter at darkhair. She shifted her stare from Sandy to me as she produced an umbrella with deliberation.

“ _You_ will get wet,” she clarified.

In the end, Sandy managed to drag me into a decent trot, and we made the awning of the designated ramen shop just before the first drizzle started. She was pushing the door open when I planted my heels and said, “Wait.”

“Ano?” she inquired.

“When you said 'friends,' does that include the one that was threatening to push my shit in the other day?”

Darkhair translated, and Sandy blanched.

“Uh, is she gonna try that again?”

Sandy lit up like the sun itself, her bubbly energy blasting away any hint of apprehension as she laughed long and loud and free, leaning back for better lung reverb, one hand waving away my worries like so much nonsense. Then she gave me the full-power enthusiasm beam, bright eyes shining as she babbled on fervently, closed fists clutched just under her chin like a cheerleader. She finished with a thousand-lumen smile and a double-fingergun aimed at my blank expression.

Darkhair blinked.

Pivoted to me.

“No.”

“... well!” I exclaimed, “no problemo!” and stomped into the shop like it had bat-wing doors.

Conversation at the only occupied table died a sudden death, Ruddy Redbitch McTittyganza from a few days prior and a tall slender woman I didn't recognize both turning to look. The angry one was already scowling when Sandy crashed in behind me, slapping me on the back and greeting her friends with boisterous cheer. She graciously twirled her palm at Darkhair as she sauntered in behind us - “Tsukuyomi Shirabe,” she said, saying it slowly for my benefit. Then the tall one - “Kazanari Tsubasa.” Ruddy Red scowled a little harder as Sandy introduced her as “Yukine Chris.”

Silence fell as they all looked at me expectantly.

“.... Mark,” I muttered, taking a chair at the table end furthest from them. The waiter stepped over, greeted us in bubbly Japanese, and handed us all menus. I scanned the moonrunes, sighed, and activated the Augmented Reality again.

Officially, the only full-duplex aspect of the nanite enhancement system is the autonomics - a direct enhancement of one's god-given nervous system; wired right into your brain stem. Everything else is just a Google Glass on amphetamines, a wearable computer controlled by thought via brainwave-scanning. That's nothing special - they had chimps working robotic arms with brain-scanning helmets in the early 'oughts - but it's simplex and read-only.

Supposedly.

The AR had surprised me before and it surprised me again as the translation function kicked in, because in addition to the ghostly subtitles that appeared under the menu, so did the voices.

“-just don't believe it,” came the angry voice I remembered well from the angry Engrish threats - Chris. “-clown here running away operator of Gear?”

“Saying of Ogawa-san,” the tall one replied coolly.

“Visually did he?”

“Well-”

I leaned forward on my elbows as my consciousness twirled giddily. The AR's machine-translation was usually delivered via subtitle or synthetic voice, complete with directional-sound enhancements cued from the actual source audio.

But I was _understanding_ the source audio - better with every second.

The waitress was collecting menus. I pointed to a safe, generic-looking option and spread my hands wide to indicate a large portion. She smiled, nodded, and turned to darkhair - Shirabe. “He to be drinking anything-”

“Beer,” she said immediately. “I'm believing he needs one.”

“You're thinking right!” she said brightly before absconding with the menus.

I pinched the bridge of my nose and focused on breathing, slowing the wild tilt-a-whirl sensation in my head as an utterly alien language was worming into my head. Simplex my ass.

“-don't even know if it gear user it was,” the tall one was saying. “Kazanari-sama said they couldn't get any solid readings. It might've been an alchemist.”

“Like the ones that almost killed us several times over?” Chris demanded. “You believe he held his own, sword-to-sword?”

She glanced askance at me, studying without being obvious about it. “... there's one way to find out.” Hands on the table, she started to rise -“there's a dojo down the street-”

“Tsubasa-san!” Sandy exclaimed, grabbing her arm, “you should get to know people before you fight them!”

“A warrior's spirit manifests in his blade,” Tsubasa said as she stood tall and judged me from the corner of her eye. “Even if he looks like a half-drowned rat now, Ogawa spoke rather highly of him-”

“Tsubasaaaaaa,” Hibiki wailed, hanging off her arm, “I haven't had a meal with you for ages-”

“Three days?”

“AGES!” Hibiki confirmed. “And he's hurt. You can play with him tomorrow, but today you're mine!”

“The keener a blade's edge, the thinner and more brittle it is,” Tsubasa said with fervor, her stern expression unable to dampen the animation in her eyes. “The closer a warrior is to death, the stronger their fighting spirit-”

Hibiki craned her head back to cry at the ceiling - “Chris, help! Tsubasa's getting away!”

Chris favored them with an exasperated look. “You're _both_ idiots.”

“Both!?” Tsubasa exclaimed.

 _“Hey!”_ Hibiki objected.

Chris shook her head, sitting rigid in her chair. “He's not our friend.”

“Not _yet!”_ Hibiki said with a wink.

“No,” Chris returned, dangerously quiet. “Never.”

“Tha-a-a-at's what Tsu-b-b-aa-a-as-s-a-san s-s-aaa-ii-d too~” Hibiki said as Tsubasa tried vigorously to shake her off, to no avail.

 _“NEVER!”_ Chris snarled, slamming a fist into the table hard enough to make the condiments rack leap. “He's one of _them_. Don't you remember what they **JUST DID?”**

That killed the chatter - even Hibiki blanched as everyone found something interesting on the table to look at. Our drinks came - two chilled cans and a glass stein, for me - and the waitress went again with only the hammering rainfall filling the room.

“Well,” I said to Shirabe in English, “Isn't this fun?”

She cut me a sharp glance that said _shut up,_ in case I didn't catch Chris's death-glare. I knew she'd sooner tongue-kiss a blender than break bread with me, but she hadn't walked away because of the competing desire to kick my ass.

I opened a beer and drained half the can in one go, ignoring the stein. Fuck the police and the Dan, too. I thought about walking out myself, but my aching legs were enjoying the rest, the thunder was really starting to rumble and with the starchy smell of noodles floating in from the kitchen, I'd realized I was hungry.

To say nothing of the _voices in my fucking head._ I pressed the cold can to my brow and grit my teeth against the dizziness, blood racing in my ears. I focused on breathing.

“Where's Maria?” Hibiki was asking.

“Shopping with Kirika,” Shirabe returned. “They'll be joining us when they're done.”

“Soon?”

“... so Maria can translate?” Shirabe asked in a tone so dry it crackled with static discharge.

Hibiki laughed brightly. “You're just cuter with Kirika around!” she insisted.

“... _cute_?” Shirabe said, enunciating the word at arm's length.

Tsubasa made a quiet sound very much like a stifled snort, causing Shirabe's deadpan to swivel to bear on her. Tsubasa sat very still, staring across the table at nothing in particular, but her shoulder-length hair - so dark it seemed a deep navy-blue, like gun bluing - was shimmering with the slight oscillations of barely-suppressed laughter.

“Would you like to add something, Tsubasa-san?” Shirabe asked crisply. Tsubasa just shook her head a little, the corners of her mouth twitching as she fought mightily to contain her composure.

“What are they shopping for?” Hibiki broke in quickly. “She usually goes shopping with you, doesn't she? Is Maria helping her pick out clothes?”

“She wants an _accordion_ ,” Shirabe said with distaste. “I can't help her with an... _accordion._ ”

“Won't be caught dead in an accordion store, Shirabe?” Tsubasa asked, the grin starting to escape. “For school?” she followed up quickly when Shirabe turned her glare back to her. “I mean - Chris!” she exclaimed desperately, “an instrument is mandatory at your school isn't it, you can't just sing, what are you playing?”

“An accordion?” Sandy asked, waggling her eyebrows.

“What? No!” Chris stammered, off-balance. “I joined as a sophomore, they can't just make me play something-”

“Have you gotten a waiver for that?” Hibiki said, leaning in - she smelled blood.

“W-well, can't I just-”

“Lots of paperwork,” Hibiki said, forcing a grave tone through her grin.

“Lots,” Tsubasa echoed.

“Should I have Kirika pick up two accordions?” Shirabe said as she held up her phone.

“W-what do _you_ play, Shirabe?”

“Violin.”

“Eh? I've never seen that!?”

“That's because Lydian Academy doesn't require an instrument,” Shirabe said smugly, and they all laughed as Chris blanched.

The food arrived, the waitress swapping my empty cans for fresh and handing me some chopsticks. I felt curious eyes on me. They murmured when I snapped the sticks in half and produced the fork I'd stolen from the slutmaid from my pocket.

“... do Americans always carry around silverware?” Sandy asked.

“Right next to their gun,” Chris muttered.

The bowl was piled high with fried noodles, covered with a sunny-side up egg. My bandaged right hand wasn't much use, so I switched to my left, attacking the plate awkwardly and almost missing my mouth on the first try.

“Looks like his aim is about the same, too-”

“Shut your fucking mouth before you swallow a fist,” I snapped.

Rumbling thunder rolled through the shocked silence.

Naturally, it had come out in Japanese.

Chris broke the silence first, a deep breath as she gathered steam. We rose as one, glares dueling down the the table's length. She sized me up, curled into fists - and looked at me like I was a singing slug.

And small wonder - I was wearing the (now-torn) jeans from the concert fight, a bright-pink, one-size-fits-small T-shirt with some anime girl and “Nico Nico Nii” printed on it that Dan had found in the nearest vending machine, stretched tight over the few pounds of gauze packed into the hole in my side. That wasn't counting three days stubble, wind-tossed hair and my bandaged hand, either. The rest were staring now, Chris's coiled menace unable to compete with the spectacle of the gaijin gastropod.

I looked at my faint reflection shining in the dim shop window, wind-blown rain streaking over the ghostly image of my garish vending-machine shirt. I'd been too hungry to notice before, but the sheer incongruous stupidity of it finally hit me, all at once.

What the _fuck_ was I doing here?

What the fuck was I doing _here_?

... what the fuck was I _doing_..?

I stabbed my stolen fork into my noodles, picked up the entire bowl, tucked it into the crook of my arm, and strode towards the door. Sandy called out to me, but I just kicked the door open and walked through without breaking stride, flipping her the bird over my shoulder.

The rain slapped me like the surface of a pool, drenching me to the skin instantly. I found a spot against the wall and leaned there, letting the howling maelstrom of the storm wash over me.

The noise was gone at last; the storm's howling, thunderous symphony holding sway over the city. I forked noodles into my mouth and watched the lighting flash and roll through the sky. The streets had emptied almost entirely, only the odd taxicab racing down the broad thoroughfare as if fearful of exposure to the storm overhead. The noodles were decent, even watered down, though I regretted not snagging the beers. As if on cue, a row of vending machines a half-block down caught my eye, and I sauntered over to them.

I saw the absence first, like a dark spot in my vision; seeming to slide away from sight like something glimpsed from the corner of one's eye, even as I looked at it. From the pool of shade she materialized; gossamer sheets of wind-whipped rain seeming to melt into the flowing silk of her outfit. It extended to her form; seeming to appear mid-stride as if she'd always been there, simply unnoticed.

We passed one another, her fixed on the sidewalk ahead and I on my noodles.

Balancing my bowl in one hand, I fished out my smartphone and waved it at the Arashi Dry machine, invoking Google Pay under my breath, then fetched it a few sharp kicks to free the stuck can, bitching about “raining and pouring” all the while. I managed to pop the tab and took a swig. Rice beer is pretty lackluster, but it's not fermented corn like Bud Light, so...

... I turned slowly to find shadow slut standing stock still on the sidewalk, having turned around to stare after me.

I quaffed my beer and shrugged, like yeah, _so what?_

She made a show of reaching across her body to rest one hand cautiously on the hilt of that nasty black tulwar of hers. “YOU!” she cried.

“WHAT!?” I shouted over the storm.

She took a step towards me. “YOU!”

I looked at the vending machine.

At the beer can.

At the bowl.

I bounced the noodle bowl in my hand, and gave her a Look, a look that asked if she really wanted to compound prior errors.

She stopped. She actually fucking stopped, uncertainty flashing across her face. I saw her eyes flicking back and forth, checking for traps, when Sandy spoke up behind her.

“Ah... excuse me, miss? Have you seen my friend?”

Shadowslut turned around and caught Sandy's massive armored gauntlet square in the chops. For all her wraithlike mystique, she caused some pretty tangible turbulence as she went flying past me before crashing to the sidewalk fifty yards away in a heap. Sandy was close behind, the rain seeming to pause for a heartbeat as the air-blast of her wake hit me, her battle-song a little off-key due to the Doppler shift.

Darkness Dame seemed to be in her element, what with the rainfall and everything. A few whirls of her sword whipped up something like shadow clones; figures as insubstantial as her that vanished when Sandy struck them. They were just starting to give her trouble when Tsu...bara? Tsubasa? I was still trying to remember her exact name when she dismounted her motorcycle and let it slide into a mob of rain-clones as they were closing in on Sandy, smashing them-

\- and of course, she was fucking singing too.

Alone they were something, but together they were truly overwhelming, their voices rising over the crash and rumble of the storm, one voice fading out as the other faded in, darting in and out of the combat with their foe with splendid coordination. Their voices rang with unseen power, the building faces reverberating and reflecting the sound better than any stadium I'd ever been in.

And I couldn't understand a word of it.

It was babble; gobbledygook; every word lighting three different meanings in my mind; at three to five words a measure. The world was spinning again, hard enough to fling my thoughts out my ears as I went down, one thought racing 'round and 'round my head -

_\- shut - off -_

\- I found myself crumpled in the corner where the vending machine met the building's wall, that mad racing _babble_ still echoing in my memory like a demented ghost.

It was still raining, and now I was covered in noodles.

Head was still spinning, and holding it didn't slow it any. Mouth dry, clothes wet. Cold rain hammering the pavement and pouring down my neck and the breakfast I'd been pursuing since I'd gotten out of bed splattered all over me.

I'd never asked for _any_ of this.

I felt myself slipping, the misery welling towards a tide, and my elbow slammed into the vending machine's side with all my desperation packed behind it, nanotube-reinforced bone smashing the plastic casing easily. The first can tasted cold and sweet and weak and above all, like another. I wondered how alcohol would work with a hole through my liver; but I barely understood the beast in my body at my best, and I was most certainly not at my fucking best, so I let it go and opened another can.

“Daijōbudesuka?” someone asked me rather tentatively.

It was Hibiki, still in her magical battle rattle, the swept-back head-spikes reminiscent of a Gundam. with tits. I didn't even know enough Japanese to curse but Geo's latest browser-game wankfest obsession had a character with that word as her catchphrase, and the current context wasn't exactly ambiguous.

“Yeah,” I rasped, opening another beer. “Yeah I'm daijoubu as _fuck_ , can't you tell?”

More bubbly and completely incomprehensible Japanese, and then an outstretched hand. I shook my head and drained the can in four swallows before reaching for another.

The tall one showed up next, already back in plainclothes, and then Bitch-Chan, only recognizable from her bad attitude, what with the Starfury model wrapped around her head. She reached out with one of the stupidly-huge, double-barreled (?) miniguns she was slinging, like she was poking - hell, she _was_ poking roadkill. I chugged the can and threw it at her.

More Japanese now; bitch-chan kicking the can at me and yelling, the nice one trying to calm everyone, the dark-haired one with her usual monotone and I couldn't for the life of me figure how to explain how couldn't _hablo_ the fuckin _engles_ , I couldn't ching-chong the nip-nong anymore, it vanished whence it came and shit in my head on the way out and I didn't have the patience for it anyway, I just wanted them to -

 **“-FUCK OFF!”** I bellowed, the small circle of girls jerking back in surprise. I'd found my feet somehow, beer suds soaking my bandaged hand. I threw the crushed can at them. “I want nothing to do with you people so just **leave me the FUCK ALONE!”**

They left, peeling off in one's and two's. Tachibana was the last to leave, looking over her shoulder at me in confusion as bitch-chan corralled her with an arm across her shoulders and led her away.

 ***

 Tokyo was better in the driving rain.

It was better still when the hail started.

The stones were small and dense and hurt, but their relentless drumming drowned out Tokyo completely and drove the last loiterers indoors. They were _there_ , but with everyone scuttling about beneath black umbrellas, warding off hailstones like centurions in testudo, they weren't really _present_. I had a stack of drinks cradled in my right arm, a can in the left. Popping tabs with only my off-hand had slowed, but not stymied me.

The city had drawn into itself like a box turtle; the displays and merchandise racks wheeled inside, out of the weather, doors closed against the wind-whipped rain, the signs less garish in the stifled sunlight. I was working into another district, judging by the increasing frequency of restaurants and bars. I was working through the beers, too, chasing the buzz, wandering deeper and deeper into the urban maze.

It was the best I ever got; a steady drumming storm drowning out my internal thoughts and leaving nothing but uniform white-noise foam behind. Storms like that came rarely and never lasted long enough, and I found myself reasoning that if I drank myself into a stupor, the hailfall might follow me into sleep, buying me a few more hours -

\- but I turned off my dreams two years ago.

I deposited my last emptied can daintily into a nearby trash can, then wound up and kicked it with all my strength, sending it careening down the hill I'd just ascended.

There was never an easy way out.

The trash can one was one of those steel-cage jobs; it bounced and rattled and caught air after deflecting off the curb to smash into a stop sign some thirty yards distant. A black umbrella paused at the crosswalk, contemplated the tableau thoughtfully, then pivoted towards me.

I was pretty sure I saw a red dress under it.

“FUCK! OFF!” I shouted through megaphone hands, then stalked away as fast as my booze-shaken stride could carry me. She caught up a block later, grabbing my shoulder to spin me around.

“ _Fucker_ ,” she informed me brusquely.

“Eat shit and die,” I slurred, knocking her hand away, only for it to come back around in an open-handed slap. I heard the sharp clap! as the sound of impact slapped into the building fronts across the street, and what was left of my consciousness splattered there with it, because all I knew was the swimming queasiness of a good drunk-on and the water rushing through the gutter as she damn near dragged me by the nape of my neck - holding me far enough out that the umbrella provided no protection, either. When my senses stopped spinning (as much) and I found brainpower to spare from the task of balancing, I rounded on her again.

“Fuckin you doin now bish?” I snarled, poking her - at her, she was weaving around a bit. “Can't you geht a hint?” She was on her phone, looking at me like I was walking trash.

She held the phone out to me, and in my stupor I accepted it by reflex. “Whuthefuckyou-”

“Mark.”

The Dan's voice, its deep volcanic rumble rustling through the earth beneath my feet.

“Oh, in t _hath_ case,” I slurred - “Thefugge _you_ wan?”

The Dan's mood is usually gauged by velocity; slowly-building thunderheads or ash thundering down Mt. Saint Helens at highway speeds. Faster is worse and worst is _stillness_ , when the air itself freezes around him - as it was doing in my ear right now.

I glanced up at the dark skies in apprehension, checking for the drone that couldn't be there, and caught a hailstone in my eye for my trouble.

“Give the phone to Yukine,” he said.

I shoved the phone at her, cursing and rubbing my eye. She pressed it to her ear.

Listened.

Smiled.

And then the ruddy red bitch **hit** me.

She stepped into the blow, an uppercut that clicked my teeth together and sent me sprawling into the push-bar door behind me, the glass portal opening with a sedate hiss of pneumatics to deposit me in an unceremonious sprawl on Pine-sol scented linoleum. An attractive young waitress in a vaguely maidlike dress was looking down at me with complete bafflement.

I heard “Yukine's” umbrella rattle in the rack as she entered - and then one platform heel was planted on my chest, making breathing difficult as she leaned her forearm on her knee, cracking her knuckles to drive home the point.

“Yuh, usually need to pay a few hundr'd bux for this treatment,” I groaned.

Her face went blank, eyes widening with rage as sudden and violent as a tempest as she hauled me up by my shirt, her fist drawing back far enough to scrape the fluorescent  fixtures, blotting out the glare for a heartbeat before the blow fell.

My skull clicked on the floor -

***

Still off.

***

“-still out of it,” Chris was saying - Japanese twisting into meaning somewhere in my frontal cortex. That was enough to start the room spinning again, my resentment of consciousness stifling every other misery for a few moments.

Just a few. My head hurt like hell.

“Just what you said to do!” the voice insisted - bell-clear, female and feisty. “Just twice.” A tinny objection. “Well, the _first one didn't take!”_

I was draped over a Formica counter. Cranking my eyes open, I found a steaming mug of coffee an inch from my nose, and a waitress tidying up in the kitchen. The uniform was odd; a suspenders skirt that stopped just below the breasts, emphasizing the bloused bosom, like that candy-anime bitch Geo never shut up about when he dragged me to that diner during a layover at Hickam -

\- Millers. Anna Millers, that was it. Popular with tourists, even a chain in Hawaii, ergo the restaurant staff most inured to sobering up drunk, ugly gajin otakus.

I curled my fingers around the mug, squeezing the water out of the sodden bandage. It was the worst kind; sides thicker than your tongue and about two ounces of capacity, but for the first time I was glad of it. Lurching up to my elbows, I sipped carefully, measuring the mug's heft thoughtfully. I cut my eyes sideways to check my target, only to find her glaring HIV and hemorrhagic fevers at me, fingers drumming the countertop.

“Drink, _asshole._ ”

Propping my head in one hand, I drank.

My legs hurt, and my jaw, and my eye, probably swelling, and my side and now my damned hand, the sodden bandage starting to disintegrate. I began unwrapping it as the waitress refilled the tiny mug and wandered off. The burn salve was pretty much all washed away, the soaked cotton padding too flattened to cushion much, so it wasn't worth anything anyway. I wadded it up and tossed it into the kitchen's trash can, the open air a relief against my burned skin.

I eyed the steaming mug, sighed, winced as the heat hit my burned hand and drank as fast as possible. “Fukkit. Gaddamit.”

Chris was staring at my hand - charred fingertips, tiny holes in the meat of my palm packed and sealed with medical glue, and bright red all over. She actually looked a bit put off.

“The fuck you looking at?” I muttered - my AR software was indeed back in Japanese Mode, without asking.

“So you suddenly remember how to speak Japanese again?” Chris growled. “How convenient.”

“Fuck you,” I said with feeling. “You're not the one with Windows 10 in his goddamned head.”

“Everyone was out looking for you, idiot. In this mess,” she jerked a thumb at the storm outside the windows.

“Good for you,” I muttered into my coffee.

“What the hell is your problem, yankee?” she demanded, her voice starting to rise. “What the hell were you doing, earlier? What- what the hell?”

“Violent videogames as a kid, what's your excuse?”

“Better than yours,” she said, steel in her voice. “You're going to apologize to Tachibana for being a fucking asshole when she tried so hard to make you feel welcome, apologize to my friends for not even properly introducing yourself, and then you're going to apologize to me for standing around while Tachibana and Kazanari were fighting like it was a fucking game!”

I rubbed my aching head, unsure if I was too tired to fight anymore or simply wearing on my last nerve. “Who was the one talking shit in that noodle shop?” I returned. “Trying so hard? She was the only one trying at all.”

She scowled. “Why would I be polite to someone who snubbed my friend-”

“The fuck did I do-”

“Didn't even introduce yourself-”

“MARK!” I yelled. “My fucking name's Mark is that good enough for you, bitch? WHAT!?” I snapped, rounding on a few young guys watching from one corner. They ducked their heads and returned to their DS's and pie.

“That's half a name,” she snapped back.

“Haumann,” I replied. “Mike Mother Fucking Hauman The Third, Esquire, at your god-damned service. Are ya happy bitch!?”

“The hell kind of name is that for a Yankee?” she demanded.

“Are you real? Are you real right now?” I said, feeling my blood begin to warm out of sheer indignation. “The fuck is an American name sound like, Chad Tiberius Thundercock McClellan Maximus!?”

“It sounds German!” she yelled back, slamming her fist into the counter again. “Just like half the alchemist bastards we've buried here!”

“DUTCH, YOU DAFFY BITCH!” I hollered back. “IT'S DUTCH!”

We fell silent as the waitress refilled my coffee without blinking, then retreated into the kitchen again.

“You fucking giant udo tree son-of-a-bitch, standing there sucking his thumb while Kazanari and Tachibana were fighting that thing to protect you!” she snarled.

“Bitch what the fuck does a tree have to do with this?”

“A big piece of useless fucking good-for-nothing deadwood just like your hairy gaijin ass-”

I yanked up my shirt and pointed at the thick, plastic-covered bandages retaining the gauze packing my wound. “What the hell did you expect me to do like this, click my clogs together and drop a windmill on her?”

“Didn't stop you from shoving a gun in my face the other day, did it?”

I hiked my shirt up again to reveal the waistband. “Bitch I have nothing on me. Nothing on me, the hell do you want?”

“That - that - bang!” she pantomimed with a fingergun, then pointed at my hand. “That worked!”

“I can't-”

“Use your other hand, you gigantic tulip-tugging _pussy_ -”

“Why don't I just put my fist through a FUCKING DYKE?” I fairly screamed. We were both on our feet now, squared off, fists balled-

 **“WHAT!?”** we shouted together as an older man who was dressed like a manager emerged from the double-doors between the storeroom and the kitchen. He froze, gaze flicking between our faces, and wisely pivoted to the coffee machine to bring the carafe over.

We turned towards each other again. Chris had the fire of real rage in her eyes, her hand creeping towards the pink crystal pendant hung around her neck -

I spread my arms wide, too-tight shirt stretching against the nothing in my waistband again. “If you think you'll need it,” I said, _“you're probably right.”_

She jerked her hand away from the pendant as if it'd burn her, expression faltering as she found something past my shoulder to look at. Probably feeling guilty about squaring off with a drowned rat she'd already clobbered. I felt a twinge of that anger again, like a tow hawser snapping tight under strain, my arm already tensing to take a swing-

I sat my ass down again, wincing as I downed more coffee. I needed it - the hangover was coming on, as if I didn't feel like hammered shit enough already. Guess I had my answer about the nanites and liver repair.

“... I _can't,_ ” I muttered at her. “Just-” I mimicked her gesture, “ _~bang~._ It'd kill me right now.”

She gave me a narrow look. “How?”

“My skeleton's reinforced with superconducting carbon nanotubes that transmit power from nanoflower supercapcitors etched into my bones, which means if I do this-” I curled my burned hand as much as I could, “-and dump enough current to arc through my fingertips and palm to complete the circuit, it forms a coil, so if I'm holding something conductive, it becomes an induction coilgun. You know what an induction coilgun is?”

She blinked. “Uh-”

“It's a thing that generates a ten-tesla electromagnetic pulse as a side effect, and that fries things like the nanites _holding my fucking liver in._ ”

“But - those explosions you-”

“Point-defense system using dispersed nanoswarms at a specific density that makes them a fuel-air explosive, which works like shit in the wind and even worse in the rain, and _also_ depletes the nanites holding my fucking liver in.”

She blinked. “But... you blew up half that stadium-”

“Yeah, well I was out of windmills.” I drained my coffee.

Sensing a sea-change, the waitress meandered over with hot joe and menus. Chris absently flopped hers open and shut, staring at the countertop. I propped my head on one arm, eyes closed, starting to think about sugar and creamer but lacking the energy to care.

“You don't _seem_ crazy,” Chris muttered.

“Coming from someone who fights extra-dimensional monsters with a suit of armor made of ancient Babylonian hell-magic powered by singing, that means a lot to me, thanks.”

“He thinks _I'm_ bad,” she muttered. “So you don't have a death wish and you're not just in it for the fighting, _what is wrong with you?”_

“The fuck does it _matter?_ ” I demanded.

“People could've gotten hurt at that stadium. People could've gotten hurt today. It matters.” She crossed her arms and swiveled back to the counter, shutting me out. “Just not to you.”

 _Tough talk from someone who shits more missiles than 7th fleet by humming six bars of J-pop,_ I thought, but didn't bother saying it.

After all, she was right.

I didn't give a single rotten fuck.

The irony was palpable - the most regimented and conformist culture on Earth had ended up defending itself with a handful of unique girls commanding tremendous individual power, and America, home of the Lone Cowboy myth, had fallen back on the tremendous collective power of the Arsenal of Democracy, of which I was but a single tooth of a single cog. If I hadn't blown Castle Wolfenstien to hell and gone, a Minuteman III would've been spun up instead. I hadn't saved the world, just a few billion dollars worth of telecom birds, and I didn't really give a shit about Iridium Communications, Inc.

Or this burnt off-brand trash Anna Millers had the balls to call coffee, now that I was sober enough to taste it. I covered my mug as the manager returned with the carafe and a pair of menus.

I never saw the taser.

Chris could only whimper in agony through a locked jaw as thousands of volts of electricity pulsed through her body with each bright staccato crackrackrack of the taser discharging. I hadn't begun to process it when the bullet smashed into my shoulderblade.

The heavy mug left my hand by its own volition as I spun and fell, a backhand whip with all my augmented strength towards the gun's report. A grunt; a second gunshot kicking in my eardrums as the bullet smashed into the paneling six inches above my head. I heard Chris topple over, wooden stool raucous against the tile, but I hardly registered it, embracing the noise as it swept up and over me, rising with my blood as my system dumped energy into my muscles -

\- when the EMP hit like a brick through my brain; ripping away the AR, the autonomics, _everything_ and the diner's lights besides, leaving me alone with my hammering heart in the dark.

Somewhere in the shadows, Chris _screamed._

Raw and desperate and _awful,_ rage and terror and defiance and pleading echoing together as she struggled violently with the “manager” trying to get his hands around her neck, fighting with far more strength than he'd expected from her slender frame. That scream tore clean through me and carried my heart away with it, and when I finally felt strength surging in my chest, it wasn't the rising fury of the _noise_ , but the hysteric mania of adrenaline-pumped terror.

The gunman was on me before I could blink, a wild banzai charge with a knife gripped tight in both hands by his hip. Muscle-memory reflex hurled me into a side-kick to meet him, impact shocking up my leg as I connected just above his groin. His momentum knocked me back into the counter, but he took it worse; folding around the blow - but without losing his knife. He barreled into me with his shoulder, but I got my hand on his inside elbow before he could recover enough to stab in earnest. We strained muscle-to-muscle for eternal heartbeats, his sneakers squeaking on tile as he drove me back against the counter, knife-tip grazing across my belly as we struggled. Our free arms had locked each other going for a grapple, until he released mine to latch onto my face, thumb jabbing into my eyeball.

I wedged my hand in the fork of his crotch and heaved him airborne without noticing the weight, lifting him almost overhead before slamming him head-first into the floor. He went limp, but the wild screaming panic pulsing through me delivered kick after steel-toed kick to his prone body -

\- _another_ scream, worse than the first, dying with a gurgle as Chris was slammed into the floor, her assailant strangling her as he twisted at the thin cord 'round her neck. She had both feet against his chest, fighting him for the necklace with both hands, back arching as she tried to pry him off to no avail. She was weakening quickly, the bastard throttling her like a man possessed, so intent on his prize he almost didn't notice me screaming as I charged, swinging my heavy stool in a double-handed grip.

I knocked the sumbitch sprawling, the shock almost tearing the stool from my hands. I wound up again, slow and clumsy and hell-bent on cracking his skull like a fucking egg. Scuttling backwards, he managed to grab a chair and fling it between him and the next blow. I kicked it away and closed in just as he sprang to his feet, knife in hand.

We froze for a heartbeat; he waiting for the inevitable opening after my next swing as I prayed for _help_ , straining with every fiber of my being to hear Chris whispering the words of her activation song over the thunder of hail on the roof - but she could only cough wretchedly.

And the man with the knife wasn't going to wait, because the instant she could sing, he was toast. He meant to have her pendant within the next thirty seconds, and now he'd kill her for it, just to save time. He crouched, tensed as I wound up again, ready to spring in after my next clumsy haymaker -

\- the stool left my hands _fast_ , twirling once before bouncing off his hasty forearm guard and landing on his feet. He kicked it away -

\- and froze, fixed by the sinister little _snick_! as I flicked open my little Emerson folder.

I hadn't lied to Chris - a pocketknife's no _weapon_. Weapons are for _fighting_ , which involves technique, none of which really matter for a weapon too small to block with and too fast to be blocked, which can kill with a darting flick. You can't _fight_ with knives, only kill with them - like a quick-draw duel in a broom closet.

We both knew this. The assassin studied me as he took up a classic tantojutsu stance, showing me he was trained, hoping to shake me even as he gathered himself for the clash. Terror bright and wild had carried me this far, and he could see it.

I couldn't rely on training or technique or augmented strength - only ferocious will might save me, and only if I had _more_. My teeth ground painfully as I tried to focus all my screaming soul into the awful purity of silence, like which restrains the avalanche.

Behind me, Chris choked and coughed on the first syllable of her Song. Ichival didn't answer, but something in me did, ripping loose and lunging for the assassin, roaring as it came.

***

We collided in a blur of feral rage and flashing blades. I'd guarded close to center and he'd lunged, twisting sideways and thrusting for maximum reach. It skipped off my knuckles and plunged into my chest.

I seized his wrist before he could yank it out and slashed his neck, twirling it hard to slash the other side too, blood spurting from his severed carotid arteries with each beat of his heart. He dropped like a stone, twisting his blade with one final effort, trying to bring me with him. He collapsed against me, and the world smelled like copper and death as our blood mixed on the floor.

I coughed, agony spreading through my chest - my lung was collapsing. I landed on my knees before I knew I was falling.

Fire spread through my chest, but the blade itself was ice.

The world shook; a blast slapping me like a giant hand, and then the world went silent, save for the wild thundering of my own heartbeat - and even that began to fade. The darkness was lit by the blazing frenzy of muzzle flashes - Ichival, Ichival at last.

I let go.

***

_I landed rolling, springing upright as the blasted hellscape lurched and rippled beneath me. The Dreaming was collapsing on us, the little pocket dimension vanishing whence it came. Delphinium was already halfway through her gate spell, the glowing portal half-formed._

_Blossoms can sense monsters a mile out, and each other even further - and that's all they consider threats, too. I was within three paces when she finally turned and drew in one fluid motion, taking a step back as I pressed her with frantic blows. She finally manged to force a clinch, digging in one heeled shoe and hurling me away. My feet left the volcanic sand, and by the time I'd rolled to my feet she'd managed to gain some room._

_“She know you borrowed that, Fuckbo-” and then she was too busy defending herself to keep talking. She was still stronger than me, but with Lily's sword in my hand and most of her magic tied up in the portal, we were almost equal. She could just keep dancing out of my range as she swung that giant cleaver of hers till she wore me down - but not before the Dreaming fell on our heads._

_When she realized, the bottom dropped out of her blue eyes, azure darkening to midnight as she called on her Trance. I had nothing to respond with save the single-minded purpose of my will, certain death drowning every qualm in a deep pool of_

***

silence-

I wheezed into the oxygen mask for long disoriented moments, the transition as abrupt as stepping through a door. The Silence slipped away and panic rushed in after as I choked on sterile air. I ripped the mask off, my sluggish limbs causing me to panic further, driving me on till I'd gripped the side-rails of the bed and hauled myself upright.

Hospital, I thought, the word swirling slowly around my head and down the drain without connecting.

Only the night-lamp over my headboard was lit, gently illuminating the room but barely touching the shadows in the corners. I gripped the rails for dear life, fearful of falling back into my own head, back on the rails hurtling towards a brick wall without a steering wheel. Memories were crowding at my head now -

         the fight

_sparkling grains of safety glass blowing across the room_

                               the blast

_the life draining from his eyes to expose the miserable fear at the bottom_

   the knives

              _steel plunging into my lung like razored ice_

the _sledgehammer blow_   bullet _spinning you like_ kicking in my eardrums _gunshot you were shot_

                                       the stool _swung it_ the kick the _knife flashing bright and quicksilver in the_

black the lunge the feral _spray of blood with every fading heartbe_ AT

                                        **HANDS**

                  ON

                                                       ME

 

                                **OFF!**

I flinched away from the touch, heart leaping into my head and beating on my eardrums with all its might. Hovering over me was her, the red one, now wearing a faded green hoodie, ugly bruises on her neck and an expression like I'd bit her.

She swallowed uncertainly, trying to twist the rail in half. “You okay,” she said. “Are. You are.” She looked tired, dark circles under her eyes, strawberry-blonde bangs messy and mussed, almost white in the soft fluorescent light, lavender eyes soft with sympathy.

I hadn't realized how much she resembled Lily.

The room was filling now, people crowding around, voices bearing down, all of it pressing in too fast, too soon. Chris silenced them with a look like a guillotine, then looked me dead in the eyes, still twisting the rail.

“Thank you,” she said.

Something deep inside me twisted and broke, nausea ripping apart my stomach and clawing up my throat. I tried to hide my face as the sobbing started, but soon I was twisting my fingers into my hair, pulling my head towards my lap as I curled up around the pain, sobbing helplessly - leave me alone, leave me alone, for mercy's sake,

 

 

 

_leave me alone._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I said - this is not going to be a happy story.


End file.
